


Cold Wind to Valhalla

by elrhiarhodan



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Dominators, Earth-1 WestAllen, Earth-52 Eobard Thawne, Eobarry, Inappropriate Use of the Speed Force (The Flash TV 2014), M/M, Minor Barry Allen/Iris West, Not All Eobards Are Evil, Post-Episode: s03e16 Into the Speed Force, So Much Dubious Science, Speedsters In Love, Trans-Dimensional Shenanigans, doppelgangers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-17
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2019-08-24 17:27:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 28,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16644605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elrhiarhodan/pseuds/elrhiarhodan
Summary: The arrival of a breacher disrupts Cisco's search for a way to get Barry out of the Speed Force.  To Cisco's dismay, the new arrival wears a very familiar face.  It's Eobard Thawne, looking like Harrison Wells, and of course, he's searching for Barry Allen.What else is new?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kyele](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kyele/gifts).



> Hi folks! After a rather long hiatus from this fandom, I'm back. Well, sort of. I started this story in the summer of 2016, after the end of Season 3, and got stuck. I decided to wait until the beginning of Season 4 to finish it (using canon to figure out how Barry got out of the Speed Force), but frankly, I found the events of S4 a little disheartening and just lost interest. 
> 
> I was poking through my WIPs folder and found this, re-read it and realized that it wouldn't take much to finish it (canon be damned). So I've decided to post and write the ending while posting the already written part (which does break my rules about posting WIPs). 
> 
> If you've read my Flash stories, you know I am an eternal EoBarry shipper and as far as I care, canon ends with the end of Season 2 (and I still haven't forgiven Harry for abandoning Barry). This story is dedicated to my partner-in-crime, Kyele, who understands and shares my deep and eternal love for Eobard Thawne and Barry Allen. She deserves as much EoBarry as the universe can provide.
> 
> Posting will be on Tuesdays and Fridays, and this should be between 16 and 18 chapters.
> 
> Title is from the Jethro Tull classic of the same name:
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _"We're getting a bit short on heroes lately.''_  
>  _Sword snap fright white pale goodbyes in the desolation of Valhalla._  
>  _And join with us please ---_  
>  _Valkyrie maidens ride empty-handed on the cold wind to Valhalla._

An alarm sounds from the breach room - a trans-dimensional portal is forming and Cisco shouts into the comms, "We've got incoming!" 

Except that help is not forthcoming. Wally's out in the field helping to put out a raging brush fire and Iris is running his comms. Caitlin's with her in the Cortex and Harry's in his lab. Barry, of course, is still trapped in the Speed Force. Ignoring the ghosts that are always haunting him, Cisco runs flat out from his workshop to the breach room just in time to see a bright blue ball of swirling energy fully coalesce. 

Cisco hits the security switch, locking down the breach room doors and thinks that it kind of sucks that he's always on the wrong side of those doors, but right now, he is the member of Team Flash best able to deal with an incoming breacher. They've had a few over the past few months – it seems that the walls between the universes have thinned in that location, making it almost an open door without an active wormhole. 

It takes surprisingly little effort to push someone back through a breach and shut the trans-dimensional doorway down. Cynthia's been teaching him, on and off for the last few months, how to refine his powers, how to tap into the universe's vibrational energy in ways that don't give him migraines (it's mostly about skimming and not scooping). He's become so proficient that just yesterday Cynthia grudgingly admitted that it just might be time to for her snip his padewan's braid (Cisco's pleased at the concept but no one, not even his girlfriend, gets near his hair with anything resembling shears).

He stands at the ready, hands extended, vibe powers simmering just below a full boil, waiting for the traveler to come out this end of the breach.

The traveler arrives much too fast for Cisco use his power. He's cleared the portal before Cisco can react, because this is no ordinary visitor, it's a damn speedster, one faster than Cisco's ever encountered. This is definitely something he's going to have to work on, because if he could have stopped him, he would have – with prejudice. The visitor is the Reverse-Flash, standing there in all his yellow and black suited glory. Cisco doesn't want to wait for the inevitable havoc to start and blasts Thawne into unconsciousness.

Cisco gives his fallen nemesis a slight kick, just to make sure he's not playing possum. Of all the things to come through a breach, it would have to be another Reverse-Flash. How could he get so un-fucking-lucky?

 _"Cisco?"_ Caitlin's voice comes over the comms and she sounds worried. _"Is that who I think it is?"_ Of course, everyone is watching from the safety of the Cortex.

"Yeah." Cisco contemplates his options and finds them limited. "Harry – want to come down with you pulse rifle and stand guard while I toss this piece of trash in the Pipeline?"

A minute or so later, Harry's banging on the breach room door and Cisco releases the locks. Harry, cradling the good old Model-52 he'd liberated from Mercury Labs so long ago, stares down at the unconscious villain. "Do we have any idea where this one came from?"

Cisco checks the data collected from the breach. "Vibrational signature's not from any dimension we've had previous contact with, so I'd have to say that's a nope."

Harry makes a sound that's a cross between a sigh and a growl. "So we can't just send this back where he came from and lock that universe out."

"Doesn't seem that way. Are the hallways clear?"

"Everyone's in the Cortex but us. Wally's still out helping the fire department control the brushfire along Highway 16 and Iris has let him know not to come back until he gets the all clear. Last thing we need is to be down another speedster."

Cisco glares at Harry. "You have _such_ a way with words."

Harry just shrugs, but Cisco knows just how much Wells misses Barry, and how much it hurts to admit it.

It takes almost no effort to manipulate the vibrations and move the Reverse-Flash out of the breach room and down to the Pipeline. Cisco snags the Reverse-Flash's chest piece before he drops him into a cell with far more care than the bastard deserves and locks him in. He doesn't close the outer door, though. It's time to wake this version of Eobard Thawne up and have a chat.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Eobard groans at the sharp buzzing in his head, rolls over, and instantly regrets it. _That was one spectacular beat-down._ Except he doesn't remember anyone throwing a punch.

Then reality returns and sadness wraps around him like a well-worn blanket. He's failed again. Only this time, he's failed and he's been captured in the process. 

"Wakey, wakey." 

That voice is familiar. And beloved. Despite the pounding headache, Eobard sits up and is greeted by the very unsmiling face of Cisco Ramon.

"Is that you, Tremor?"

"Tremor – that's a new one. In this world, I'm Vibe."

Eobard nods, winces from the pain, and strives for his usual level of sang-froid. "I'm guessing this containment is standard operating procedure for unknown breachers."

"Oh, you're not exactly unknown to us, _Reverse-Flash_." 

There's so much hatred in the way Cisco says his code-name. "You don't like me? Why? I've done nothing to you."

Cisco laughs and it's a nasty sound. "We've had enough encounters with the Reverse-Flash to know his intentions are never benign."

Eobard isn't terribly worried at what his doppelganger might have done, how bad could it be? Perhaps it's time to remind this Cisco Ramon about the first rule of doppelgangers in the multiverse. "And you're telling me that all Reverse-Flashes are the same?" Eobard sighs and pulls off his cowl.

"What the fuck?" Cisco looks shocked. No, not shocked, but appalled. "Why are you wearing that face?" 

Eobard scrubs said face and winces as the heavy glove drags on sweaty skin. "Whose face should I be wearing?"

"Umm, your own?"

Eobard yanks off the gauntlets, carefully tucks them into his belt and scratches his head. The buzz cut still feels wrong, but a fire-breathing meta had gotten a little too close and his hair had paid the price. Speedster healing doesn't extend to body parts that lack blood supply and it had simply been easier to take a trimmer to his whole head than to try and salvage the unburnt bits. "This is my face. It's the one I was born with and the one I'll die with, if I ever get that chance."

"No, it's not. That's the face of Harrison Wells. You stole it from him." 

This Cisco is so adamant. And so crazy. "Sorry to disappoint you, but I don't know anyone named Harrison Wells." Eobard's hope for a quick release dim.

Cisco looks over his shoulder; there's someone else in the corridor outside his cell, someone just out of visible range.

Eobard leans back against the cell wall, he's hot and uncomfortable and at a complete disadvantage. There's something that's interfering with his powers, something that's making him mildly sick. It's more than just the residue of whatever Cisco – Vibe – had blasted him with. It feels like it's coming out of the very air he's breathing. "You've got an interesting set up here."

"Yeah, and the power dampeners are turned up to eleven. Sorry if you're uncomfortable."

Eobard doesn't even bother getting annoyed. There's no point to it. Cisco – and presumably the person hiding in the shadows – is already predisposed to antagonism. "No, you're not."

Cisco shakes his head and then nods. "You're right, I'm not."

"What I don't understand is the hostility. I've done nothing to you. This is the first time I've ever been here."

"Time, time, time. That's a funny word for you to use. Your doppelganger certainly had fun fucking around with time."

"Ah. Well, I'm sorry for that, but he's not me. Like I said, not all Reverse-Flashes are the same throughout the multiverse. Just as not all Cisco Ramons are the same, either."

That seems to give this Cisco something to think about. He pauses, stares at Eobard and makes a face. "Get comfortable, you're going to be here a while." An outer door drops down and Eobard's left alone in the blue-tinted half-light. He pats his chest and panics – the space that his emblem is supposed to occupy is empty. His captors have taken it and Eobard hopes they won't destroy it. He sits there, realizing that he's just not captured, but that he's fallen into enemy hands. This world might not be in thrall to the Dominatrix and her alien allies, but it's apparently still a terrible and dangerous place.

He hopes Barry isn't here on this hostile Earth. He prays his husband is somewhere safe.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another conversation with Thawne reveals some uncomfortable truths, ones that Cisco finds hard to accept.

Cisco tosses the Reverse-Flash's emblem to Harry. "Want to take a look at that? Maybe it'll give us some clue as to why he's here, what he's up to?"

Harry catches it and without a word, heads into the side lab he's once again commandeered. 

Iris is still running the comms with Wally and Caitlin gives Cisco a thoughtful look. "You okay?"

Cisco sighs, "Not really. Never easy seeing that suit on anyone. Especially when he's wearing _that_ face."

"Do you believe him? That he was born in that body?" Caitlin had listened in on the conversation Cisco had with the prisoner in the Pipeline.

"Don't know." But the truth is that he can't shake the feeling that this particular Reverse-Flash is rightfully inhabiting a body that usually belongs to Harrison Wells.

"What's the matter?" Caitlin runs a cool hand down his arm.

"Something this Thawne said to me. 'Not all Cisco Ramons are the same.' He's right, they're not – I've met one of my doppelgangers and he'd been an insane megalomaniac." He remembers how Reverb oozed corruption like a freshly blooming corpse flower. "Since I know that's true, I have to accept that not all Reverse-Flashes are the same, either. And we know that not all Caitlin Snows are the same, nor are not all Barry Allens are the same." Cisco looks over at Iris, who's having a very intense conversation with her brother. _But perhaps all Iris Wests are the same – good and strong and caring..._

"So that means …" Caitlin lets Cisco draw the conclusion.

"That quite possibly this particular Eobard Thawne isn't another Doctor Evil." Cisco taps on one of the monitors and calls up Thawne's cell. The man's sitting on the floor, much as Cisco had left him, looking defeated and dejected. The Thawne he knew had never allowed himself to display such emotions. As Cisco watches, Thawne pulls at something from under his suit – a chain with a ring on it. The cell camera lacks resolution to pick up details in their current setting, but the ring doesn't look like the signet ring that their Thawne had used to hold the suit. This one looks like a wedding band. Thawne tucks it away before Cisco can zoom in.

"Cisco?"

He looks up as Iris calls his name. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah – Wally's done helping the fire department. Can he come back or do you think he should stay out on patrol."

"Well, this alternate Reverse-Flash isn't going anywhere, so you can bring Wally in."

Less than a minute later, Kid Flash zooms into the Cortex and stray papers go flying. He stinks of ash and sweat and Cisco is not looking forward to making the necessary repair to the suit. He definitely needs to work on a cleaning system. A few seconds later, the suit's on display in the niche that had originally contained Barry's suit. Cisco doesn't want to think about that.

"So – Iris says we've got a new Reverse-Flash in the Pipeline."

"Yeah, but stay away from him, okay? No need to let him know we've got a speedster."

"Okay, but you know, I never understood the whole Reverse-Flash – Eobard Thawne thing." Wally pauses before saying, "Barry never talked about him." 

Cisco feels his soul die a little at the use of the past tense, and his tone is harsh and abrupt. " _Talks_ , you mean. Barry's not dead."

Wally nods quickly, accepting Cisco's correction. "Yeah, right, _Talks_. And the one time I asked Iris about him, she gave me a look that made me glad I am a speedster. Dad's was just as bad. I mean I know the Reverse-Flash killed Barry's mom and stuff, but no one's ever told me why he did it."

"Because no one really knows the truth. Barry had one coherent conversation with him and it seems that at some point in the future, the Flash had done something bad and made Thawne hate him. But he also said he'd been obsessed by Barry, and wanted to beat him. So – who knows?" Cisco gestures around him. "He built this because he was an obsessed fanboy who was dissed by his idol? Doesn't make sense, but it's the reality we've been given."

"So – you think the guy in the Pipeline hates his version of the Flash? Maybe he was chasing him and ended up here by mistake?"

Cisco can only guess at the reasons for this Reverse-Flash's sudden appearance. But there's no reason to guess, is there? "Those are very excellent questions, Wally, ones which need to be asked." Cisco pats Wally's knee, get ups, and heads over to the side lab to check on Harry's progress with the Reverse-Flash's emblem.

Harry looks reluctantly impressed. "This is – I have to admit – extremely advanced technology. The data circuitry is encoded at a sub-atomic level. Tachyon enhancements are hard-wired and the power supply is insanely efficient – works off of the lightning generated by the user's speed, and the excess is fed back into the wearer at a cellular level. There are enhancements here that are linked directly to the suit itself – not just biometric monitors but active systems, and one that just might be a cloaking system."

"You're shitting me." Of all the goals he has for improving the suits, making Barry's – _Wally's_ – invisible when not at speed, is at the top of the list, right after making them self-cleaning.

"I shit you not, Ramon." Harry grins. "It'll take some work, and perhaps some cooperation from our 'guest', but I can replicate almost everything in here."

" _Almost everything?_ You are admitting that there's something you can't do?"

Harry gives him the stink eye and then grimaces. "Yeah. The comm system – as far as I can tell – operates across an unlimited number of bands and generates its own frequencies. It's locked down with an atomic-level vibrational signature – one presumably generated by our guest. It's also linked to another badge and is sending out signals to it. But there's no reply."

"A homing beacon?"

"Yeah."

"So our evil speedster has a partner in crime. That is disturbing on so many levels."

"Why do you automatically assume he's evil?" Harry's tone is casual as he's focusing on the emblem's circuitry but the question is as pointed as a knife.

"Well… " Cisco's had a version of this conversation with Caitlin, not a half-hour ago, and with Wally, too. "It's just …"

"Kind of hard not to react to the suit _and_ the face?" Harry finishes the thought.

"Yeah." Cisco rubs his chest just as Harry looks up. The expression on Harry's face – the totally unguarded fatherly concern that is usually reserved for Jesse – makes Cisco ache. "I guess I should talk to him again."

"Want me to come with you?"

Cisco nods, not trusting his voice.

Harry pockets the emblem, picks up his pulse rifle, and the two of them head down to the Pipeline. They have no other prisoners at the moment, so Thawne's cell is still in the prime position. Gesturing for Harry to stay hidden in the shadows, Cisco presses his palm against the security panel and the outer door rises. Thawne's still sitting on the floor, but he's taken off the top half of his suit and is using it as a pillow, cushioning his head as it rests against the wall. Thawne's eyes open and Cisco's struck by the wariness and vulnerability in his expression.

But Thawne's tone is genial. "What can I do for you, Vibe?"

Cisco feels weird standing over Thawne, it's too reminiscent of the days when the fake Wells was faking his paraplegia. He sits down so they're at eye level. "Care to answer a few questions?"

Thawne sighs and smiles, just a little. "If I can, I will."

Heart in his throat, Cisco asks the question he should have asked hours ago. "Why are you here?"

Thawne answers easily enough, "I'm looking for someone."

That is a remarkably straightforward answer, and Cisco can't bring himself to trust it. "Who are you looking for?"

"Barry Allen. You wouldn't perchance happen to have any stray ones hanging around. I'm missing mine." Thawne's smiling.

 _Of course Thawne's looking for Barry. Why else would he be here?_ Cisco is torn between terror and hysteria, and for the moment, lets hysteria win. "A few months ago, we actually did have an extra Barry Allen."

"Oh, really?" Thawne sits up and leans forward, looking as if he's about to get a most longed-for Christmas present.

"Yeah, he was masquerading as Savitar." It's a test. Cisco knows from Jay that Savitar had been kicking around the multiverse, challenging speedsters he'd thought worthy.

But Thawne hasn't encountered the so-called God of Speed. "Savitar?"

"A Hindu speed god."

"On this world maybe. On my Earth, 'Savitar' is the name of a Vedic sun god. But why would any Barry Allen think that it's okay to pretend to be a deity?"

"Because he'd been a pathetic loser of an evil time remnant who wanted to be a god, that's why."

"Ah, then that's definitely not the Barry Allen I'm looking for." Thawne tilts his head back and sighs.

"No, didn't think so."

"Out of curiosity, what happened to him? This Savitar time remnant."

"Same thing that happened to your doppelganger after he betrayed us, he got paradoxed out of existence." Cisco still enjoys the memory of seeing that pizza-faced bastard evaporate into nothingness. 

Thawne ignores Cisco's comment about his doppelganger and slumps back against the cell wall. "So, no other spare Barry Allens?" His tone is light, but his eyes are serious.

"Nope, sorry. We've got no other Barry Allens hanging around waiting to be killed by you." 

"What?" Now Thawne looks horrified. "Killed by me?"

Cisco feels particularly vicious and forgets the half-baked resolution to remember that this Eobard Thawne isn't necessarily evil. "Isn't that why you're looking for Barry? The Flash? Your eternal quest to make him pay for the mysterious wrong he did to you sometime in the future, isn't that why you killed his mother, tried to kill him? Isn't that why you made him into the Flash?" 

The words hang in the air for a heartbeat and Cisco can't believe how easily he loses it. He feels Harry's eyes on him, willing him to calm down.

Thawne abruptly stands up and bangs on the cell door, which shudders from the force of the blow. "That is a damn lie – I would do nothing to harm Barry. And to say I killed Nora? That lovely, brilliant woman? How could you accuse me of something so vile?" Thawne is panting, his eyes are wild. "I would never do anything to hurt either of the Allens."

Cisco can't help himself and takes great pleasure in informing this Eobard Thawne of his doppelganger's crimes. "The Earth-1 version did. He travelled back in time to kill Barry when he was eleven and when Barry's future self took eleven year old Barry away to safety, Thawne got frustrated, stabbed Nora Allen to death, and let Barry's father take the fall for it. And when Thawne realized he couldn't get back to his own time, he murdered Harrison Wells, stole his identity and built this place. Then he engineered the accident in the particle accelerator that created the Flash."

The Thawne Cisco knew and once worshipped had been an exceptional actor, his self-control honed over fifteen years of pretense and patience. The one he'd met two years ago had no emotional control at all. Until this instant, Cisco thinks that this version of Eobard Thawne falls somewhere in between. But he's wrong. The devastated expression on this Thawne's face is too raw to be faked.

Thawne paces and mutters, "No, no, no – that's not possible. Why would he do something like that? Why would he want to kill Barry Allen?"

"The question from this side of the cell door is 'why wouldn't _you_ '?"

Thawne looks right at him and to Cisco's shock, the man's crying. 

"Because he's my husband."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Earth-52 Eobard Thawne is a desperate man and he's willing to take a chance that this particular Cisco Ramon is not that different from the one he'd left behind. So he tells the truth and hopes that it will set him free.

It's been six months since he's been home, since he's seen his family, his friends, and most important, the man he loves more than anything in the universe. In the _multiverse_.

Hopping from dimension to dimension, hoping each trip brings him closer to Barry and then a way home, has been sucking the life out of him. It takes a great deal of energy to open a breach; what Tremor can do with barely a thought requires Eobard to run at near-luminal speed. The cost is high, temporal and psychological displacement is a constant risk, as is the energy drain – which can become permanent if he's not careful. But Eobard can't afford to be careful, to stay still and _wait_. Barry is lost somewhere in the multiverse and Eobard needs to find him.

It would be nice to think that perhaps Barry's found a way to get home, but he hasn't. There's one unexpected side benefit to breach-running – Eobard can connect with Tremor for a few brief seconds, just long enough to learn that his husband's still missing, but his friends are still alive. And each time they connect, Tremor tries to grab hold of Eobard and bring him home.

And each time, he fails. So Eobard keeps running until he lands in another universe and continues his search.

He's been to dozens of different Earths, each time triggering the homing beacon in his emblem, hoping against hope that _this_ world is holding his husband safe and securely. But his emblem is now in the hands of his captors and he has no way of knowing if Barry's here. Maybe is he cooperates, they'll give it back to him and let him go.

Hungry and weary, Eobard takes off the upper part of the suit and uses it as a cushion against the cell's inhospitable walls. He's just about to doze off when the outer door opens.

It's Cisco – and there's someone else hovering on the periphery. He wonders if it's this world's Barry Allen.

Cisco's a little less hostile and finally asks a question worth answering. But the interrogation quickly devolves into farce before Cisco rips his soul apart.

Eobard knows, intellectually, that there are likely an infinite number of Eobard Thawnes, and an infinite percentage of them are Reverse-Flashes, and as he'd reminded Cisco, not all doppelgangers are the same, but to discover that even one of them despised Barry Allen so much that he tried to kill him – when Barry was a young child – almost destroys him.

Cisco's staring at him with wide, disbelieving eyes. "Your husband?" 

"Yes, my husband. I guess you find that hard to believe, given your own experiences with the Eobard Thawne of this universe."

"Yeah, hard isn't the world. I'd go for 'impossible'."

Eobard shakes his head, a gesture that only serves to summon agony. Between his inter-dimensional travel, the blast from Vibe that knocked him out, and the cell's power dampeners, his body and his mind are on the verge of collapse. But he can't afford to show any weakness. "I can prove it to you."

"How?"

Eobard takes off the chain with his wedding band and unclasps it. He holds his ring on his palm, taps it, and a holographic video appears. It's the one thing that's kept him sane these long months – the living memory of his wedding to Barry.

He'd paid for the highest quality recording of the ceremony. There had been over a dozen cameras hovering around them during the ceremony, capturing every angle, every expression, and Eobard had chosen the best ones to be implanted into his band, ones focusing on Barry's face, his eyes and his lips as he spoke his vows, as he listened to Eobard say his vows in response. It's disquieting to share this with strangers, but if it proves that his intentions are benign and gets Eobard out of his cell, it's worth it.

But he doesn't have to start at the beginning. In addition to the ceremony, Eobard had included many moments from the wedding reception, and lets the video picks up just where it had stopped the last time he'd watched it. Ironically, it's at the one that he's found hardest to watch – when his brand new mother-in-law stands up, champagne glass in hand, and tells the world just what she thinks of him.

The audio is as clear as the video and it's easy to hear the joy in Nora's voice. _"It's often said that the best marriages are commitments not just between the two individuals saying their vows and promising to love, honor and cherish, but is a commitment between their families."_ Nora pauses for a moment and smiles, _"Thirteen years ago, Eobard made me an offer. 'Come to Central City, be the head of my legal department, you won't regret it.' And while I've never regretted working at S.T.A.R. Labs, I've also spent the better part of the last decade covering Eobard's ass."_

There's a pause and a beat and Nora looks right at the camera – the one that had been hovering over Eobard's shoulder – and says, _"Figuratively speaking, of course."_

The room erupts with laughter at Nora's almost-inappropriate – but very Nora Allen-ish – humor. _"Even before Eobard had the good sense to fall head over heels in love with my son, I considered him family. An annoying brother, one who is always too smart for his own good, but with a heart that doesn't quit. "_

Nora pauses again, her eyes are twinkling. _"Eobard Thawne is a man of unquestionable honor, someone I trust without reservation, someone who is the perfect match for my Barry, but he's also a man of sometimes questionable emotional intelligence. Do you have any idea how difficult it was to watch him look at my son like a puppy waiting for adoption? I had to bribe him with a triple batch of my double-fudge and salted caramel cookies to finally get him to ask my son out on a date."_

The camera returns to Barry's face and he's blushing bright red, and he's also biting his lip in an attempt to maintain some level of dignity. He doesn't succeed and bursts out with a thoroughly embarrassed _"Mom!"_.

Nora pays no heed. _"I couldn't be any happier for my son and for my friend – and I am delighted to stand here and embarrass them both."_ Nora raises her glass and in the background, there's the sound of people getting to their feet to join in the toast. _"Please share in my delight and wish them every happiness in the world. To Barry and Eobard!"_

Eobard closes his fist around his ring, stopping the playback. There's a buzzing in his head that has nothing to do with the power dampeners and everything to do with too much emotion. He slowly and carefully returns the ring to the chain and places the chain back around his neck before looking at the man on the other side of the cell door.

With careful, measured tones, Eobard says, "There are two people in my life that I would kill to protect. One is my husband and the other is Nora Allen. It has been six months since I've seen either of them and I will do anything I have to, to see them again."

Cisco stares at him, his expression unreadable, and says nothing.

Eobard shakes his head and lets out a sad little laugh. "And of course, you don't believe me. You think what you've just seen is a very elaborate charade, one I've staged for some unfathomable and evil purpose."

Cisco still doesn't speak, but turns to the person still hidden in the shadows.

Eobard is not above begging, "For what it's worth, I apologize, on behalf of my doppelganger – who apparently really wasn't my doppelganger – for all the evil that he's done. If I could travel back in time and prevent what happened, I would." But Eobard knows better that to make such a massive change to the timeline.

That gets a reaction from Cisco. "Don't bother, we've been there, done that, and I'm not going through that hell again." 

"Then please just let me go, let me get on with finding my husband and bringing him home. There's so much at stake." He thinks of the Dominatrix and what she'd done to his world. He knows that they'd defeated her and her alien allies, but she certainly had left chaos in her wake. He can only pray that his family – the one he left behind – is safe. "I promise not to linger. I just want to go and find my husband and get home." Eobard hopes that's not a lie, as he doesn't think he has the energy for a sprint, let alone a hop to another dimension. Of course he could ask this Cisco to open a portal, but Eobard doesn't think the man would piss on him if he was on fire.

Once again, Cisco glances over to his right. 

"Is that your Barry Allen?" Eobard tries to see who's hiding, but the lighting and the shape of the door make it impossible. Fed up and exhausted and grieving, he tells Cisco, "If you're not going to let me go, just shut the damn door and leave me alone."

"Open the door, Cisco." The shadow speaks and it isn't Barry Allen. No, it sounds like …

"Harry? Are you sure?" Cisco's hand is hovering over the control panel.

The voice from the darkness says, "I know what desperation looks like, remember. This isn't some elaborate game. Open the damn door or I'll do it for you."

Cisco does as he's asked and the door swings open. But before Eobard can cross the threshold, Cisco's companion steps out of the shadows. The blue light gleams off of an old-fashioned pulse rifle and a pair of even more old-fashioned spectacles.

Eobard meets a familiar pair of blue eyes and starts laughing. And keeps laughing until the pain almost breaks him apart.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry feels ... a lot of things. Regret for what he'd once done in his effort to save Jesse, compassion for a man who wears his face but doesn't have his name, and a scientist's curiosity about how it can all turn out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is two days late - I have been very under the weather and just lost track of the day of the week. A new chapter will go up tomorrow, as well. Thank you for your patience.

Harry might have been here before, but it's not déjà vu. It's nothing like the first time he'd come face-to-face with a doppelganger – that kick in the stomach moment when HR had stepped through the breach and smiled and spouted nonsense. Nor is it anything like the time he stood in front of the Pipeline and faced down the younger, barely sane Eobard Thawne. 

This is a memory, though. The memory of himself on the other side of that cell door, waiting for his friends, his executioners, to render judgment. But instead of death, they gave him moment of perfect grace, a chance at redemption, a chance to prove that his life – and the life of his daughter – would be been worth saving.

He still needs to pay that debt forward, and it's a sweet irony that he's crossing out the red in his ledger with someone who is as desperate as he'd once been.

When Thawne stops laughing, Cisco makes the introductions. "Eobard Thawne Mark 2, meet Doctor Harrison Wells of Earth-2."

"Come on." Harry slings the Model-52 over his shoulder and gestures with his hand. "Unless you want to stay in there."

Thawne, Mark-2, steps across the threshold and to Harry's private delight, taps the top of the doorframe and then grabs onto it as his legs wobble. "Sorry about that – it's been a rough day."

Harry steadies Thawne and turns to Cisco. "Can you get him something to eat?"

Cisco glares at him. "I'm now your errand boy?" But he does ask Thawne with surprising civility, "Are you like every other one who wears that face and will want something from Big Belly Burger?"

Thawne manages to right himself. "Who do I have to kill for a triple-triple with a side of curly fries and a strawberry shake?" 

Cisco snarks, "Kill? Probably not the best choice of words, Thawne, but no one. We'll have your order in a bit."

"Bring it down to my quarters, Ramon." Taking Thawne into the Cortex isn't a good idea at the moment.

"Aye-aye, and whatever." Cisco lopes back down the pipeline.

Thawne watches Cisco saunter away and give Harry a measured look. It really is kind of creepy – HR had an indefatigable smile – like a serious thought never crossed his mind. But this one, he reminds Harry of himself in those terrible, desperate months. 

"What?"

"Why are you putting yourself out for me?"

Harry sighs, "It's … complicated."

"I'm considered relatively intelligent – "

Harry lets out a choked laugh. "You're a Thawne, and you're wearing my face. I think you can do better than that."

"Okay, I have the highest recorded IQ on my Earth."

"That's better." Harry laughs. "I would hate to think that you'd be that much of an outlier."

"Huh?" 

"Modesty. Thawnes – and Wellses – are not known for that quality."

Thawne shakes his head. "My point is, I can probably figure out your 'complicated' without too much effort."

"I know, I just think that getting a crash course on the crap that's gone on around here the last three years can wait for you to take a shower, have a meal, and get out of that yellow horror."

Thawne holds out the jacket. "Horror? This?"

"Have you ever seen it on a mannequin? It looks like dead flesh."

"If I wasn't so hungry and desperate for that promised shower, I might just be insulted." Thawne smiles slightly and Harry has the feeling that is his baseline expression when he's not looking like death warmed over. "But yes, it is the truth. My Barry has made that comment a few times." Thawne sighs sadly, but doesn't say anything more.

Harry takes Thawne the long way around, to the north quadrant elevators. The short way is still – after six months – blocked by the rubble left in the wake of Savitar's betrayal. Thawne rests against the elevator wall and Harry feels the pull of empathy.

"Can you give me an uncomplicated reason why you're helping me?"

_Because I've been in your shoes. Literally_. Almost without thought, Harry rubs his side, as if he can still feel where Grodd's claws had swiped him. But all he says is, "Because I'm that kind of guy."

"Somehow, I don't quite think so."

Harry lets that go for the brief elevator ride. The doors opens onto the ninth floor lobby and Harry leads Thawne down the corridor to the suite that first Jesse, and then the team, had built out for him. HR had preferred to bunk closer to an exit – presumably so he could do late-night coffee runs – and if Cisco was to be believed – have booty calls and get back inside without anyone seeing his walk of shame.

In his bedroom – his home away from home – Harry points towards the small reading nook. "Sit if you want. I'll get you some clothes. I think we're the same size."

Thawne snickers. 

Thank goodness there's an unopened package of briefs in the back of the drawer – Harry draws the line at sharing shorts – and a pair of running shoes that he hasn't had the chance to put on yet. The rest of the clothing is the basic black culled from his day-to-day wardrobe. "Here you go."

"Shower?"

"Right, right." Harry dumps the armful of clothes onto Thawne and takes him to bathing facilities. "I hope you haven't been in that suit since you left home."

"It's not that bad. Although I think the cleaning scrubbers may have worn out a few weeks ago. I'm a little … ripe."

"Perhaps we can repair them." Harry can practically hear Cisco's squeals of joy over a self-cleaning suit.

"And get your hands on some new tech for your own speedster?"

"I'm that transparent?" Harry raises an eyebrow.

"It's what I would do." Thawne mimics the gesture.

Harry feels oddly warmed by the exchange. "You might call yourself Eobard Thawne, but I'm pretty sure you're your own universe's version of Harrison Wells." 

Thawne shakes his head, but he's smiling. "Enough with the insults."

Harry pushed the shower room door open. "Everything else you need is in there. Come back to the room when you're done. And don't go exploring. Parts of this place are unsafe."

"And other parts of this place are off limits to a potential enemy?"

"Like I said, you really are a Wells." Harry let the door swing closed, feeling like he'd just found a brother.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Eobard's not certain he wants to trust the man who wears his face but doesn't have his name. There are way too many secrets hidden behind those sharp eyes. And for all of those secrets, he seems far too friendly and willing to help, a stark contrast to Tremor's – _no, Vibe's_ – bitter distrust.

But he's always prided himself on his ability to read people, and Eobard finds nothing sinister in Harrison Wells' friendliness. Oh, yes – he wants something, and it's more than just the tech in his suit. Harry wants his help with something. He's rather desperate, Eobard thinks. 

It might be worth a quick sprint around this facility to discover just what's going on, but Eobard is oddly reluctant to breach his host's trust. 

_Don't be silly, Eo. Vibe's likely to sense any meddling and you'd rather not end up back in that cell, would you? At least not until you've had a nice long shower, get into some clean clothes, and maybe have a meal >?_

Barry's voice is always the voice of reason, the voice of his conscience. And since their forcible separation, the voice of his sanity.

_I miss you._ Eobard brushes his fingers over the ring. _I miss you so much._

Barry doesn't answer.

Eobard tries to push aside the heartache, but it's not going anywhere. It sits like a python on his shoulders, wrapped around his chest, making it hard to breathe, hard to think. What will happen to him if he never finds his Barry? The future will be an endless and dark road if his has to travel it alone. Eobard can see himself slipping into madness as everyone he loves leaves him behind, and he left alone to fight the temptation to run back, to fix the unfixable, to stop the Dominatrix before she's ever born. 

Therein is the path to madness and he wonders if that is what had happened to this world's Eobard Thawne, if he'd tried resetting time to get his Barry back and lost his sanity in the process, destroying everyone he's supposed to love.

Eobard would rather let the Speed Force take him than end up like that.

Eobard can't remember the last time he'd had the luxury of bathing and strips down to the skin. He can't quite ignore the fetid stink coming from the lower half of his suit – the cleaning sensors are definitely not working. Under the best of circumstances, he and Barry wear out their suit linings every month or so, and he's been wearing his for almost six months straight.

Well, there's nothing he can do about that at the moment.

The shower is heavenly, the water scalding hot and plentiful – seemingly at odd with the decrepit state of this facility. But Eobard's not going to complain. As he reaches for the soap, a wave of dizziness swamps him – too much heat, too much stress, too few calories. He turns the water to a tepid flow and lets it rain down on him.

Eobard closes his eyes and loses himself in memory.

_"So, what do you think?" Eo's anxious for Barry's opinion._

_They've been dating for about a year, but it's the first time Eobard's brought Barry out to his house in the forest. He doesn't know what he's taken so long to do this. Perhaps because he's never brought anyone out here before. Certainly not the casual hookups he's had; bodies he'd used to scratch an ever-less-frequent itch, nor even the extremely occasion friend-with-benefits whose opinion had actually meant something to Eobard._

_"It's beautiful." Barry wanders from room to room and Eobard trails helplessly behind him. When Barry pauses at a massive glass and bronze frieze and gapes, Eobard stands next to him, his heart swelling with pride._

_"That's from The Normandie, isn't it?"_

_"You know your Art Deco."_

_"It's my favorite style – speed and motion captured in three dimensions."_

_Eobard has to wonder if Nora had prepped her son, giving him hints about what Eobard likes. She'd handled the brokerage of several important acquisitions and knows his tastes quite well._

_"I didn't know that any of the panels were in private hands." Barry is awed._

_"A very few are." Eobard leans into Barry and whispers, "And I'm one of the lucky ones."_

_Barry turns his face towards Eobard's and steals a quick kiss. "I think I'm the lucky one."_

_It feels to Eobard as if his heart is too big for his chest. He wants to drag Barry off and show him the bedroom, and then show him what they can do in the bed that's there. But even though they've made love countless times before, today, Eobard wants to show some restraint._

_"I thought we'd have a picnic lunch. There's someplace I'd like to show you."_

_"I'd like that." Barry smiles and his eyes glow and Eobard is again struck through the heart._

_There's a glade deep in the woods, a natural break in the forest and the ground is covered with clover and scrub. It's a hidden place, and Eobard doesn't visit it often enough to form a path, so the walk is a bit tedious. It's worth it, though. There's a patch of milkweed just at the far edge of the glade, a feeding ground for migrating Monarch butterflies and today, they're giving Barry and Eobard a show, flitting in and out of the sunlight like fairies performing a ballet._

_Barry even whispers, "Did you plan this?"_

_"I wish I had."_

_The picnic is a success by any measure. The food is good, the wine – actually Champagne – is excellent, and Barry's eager for some al fresco kissing and perhaps more. The day is warm and there are all kinds of innocent reasons for them taking their shirts off, but the best reason of all is Barry crouched over him, looking like a Renaissance angel limned in golden sunlight._

_Eobard isn't usually so passive, but Barry asks him to hold still – not with words, though. He takes Eobard's hands and puts them over his head, wrists crossed, as if they're bound. Eobard understands the silent request and honors it, lying on the blanket without moving. Barry takes his time, exploring Eobard in ways that he never has before. He's effusive with praise, marveling over things about Eobard that Eobard has never considered marvelous._

_"Do you know what this is called?" Barry traces the cup of skin and muscle and bone at the base of Eobard's throat._

_"No, I don't." Eobard is a physicist, it's been decades since he's studied anatomy._

_"The suprasternal notch."_

_Eobard parses the word in his head and it does make sense. He's about to give Barry an impromptu linguistics lecture when Barry says, "It's also the best cup to drink Champagne from." Barry picks up the bottle and raises an eyebrow suggestively._

_Eobard smiles and tilts his head back. The liquid is cool against his skin, but Barry's lips and tongue are warm. He laps up the wine and kisses Eobard._

_"You taste like stars."_

_Barry kisses him again and says for the first time, "I love you."_

_Eobard sits up, stunned into wonder and feels like an idiot when he asks, "Are you sure?"_

_"I was sure the moment you barged into my mother's office, looking for cookies and advice." Barry's smile is like the sun. "I want you to know that. I love you and I'll always love you."_

_Eobard knows that Barry isn't looking for Eobard to swear his own undying love – this is just Barry being forthright and honest as he always is. "I love you, too. I don't know why I haven't said it before, but I do. " Eobard feels giddy, and he's frightened, too._

_But there's nothing to fear. Barry leans forward and kisses him again, the merest brush of lips. "Good."_

Eobard reaches out to take Barry in his arms but his palm doesn't find warm, living flesh – just the cold, wet tile that lines the shower stall. He wants to beat against it, to tear it away and find his husband. But Barry's not on the other side of the wall. He's not here and Eobard does what he has to. He moves forward.

He dries off and dresses in the borrowed clothes, which feel far too much like his own. It's both comforting and disturbing, but as his life as spiraled from one of happy privilege to dedicated heroism to involuntary exile, Eobard accepts the comfort and disregards the disturbance. Small pleasures like clean skin and clean clothes are graces he can ill-afford to ignore.

Eobard is just outside the bedroom door and he hears Cisco arguing with Harry. The door is shut and the words are indistinct and Eobard is still inclined to be a better guest. He knocks just as Cisco says his name and there's dead silence, until Harry says "Come in."

There's a bag with the Big Belly Burger logo and a large drink cup with the same motif on the small table in the corner. Eobard ignores them in favor of the tension in the room. "Is everything all right? I thought I heard someone about to take my name in vain."

Cisco lets out a bark of laughter and Harry gives him a reluctant smile. "Cisco was worried that you'd be annoyed he didn't get you the strawberry shake you'd asked for."

"They were all out, got you chocolate instead." Cisco rocks back on his heels.

As deflections go, this is a good one. Eobard plays along and picks up the cold cup and sucks on the straw. It's horrible, of course, and he almost moans in pleasure. "It's fine. Thank you."

Cisco stares at him, his head tilted to one side, that magnificent fall of hair half-covering his face. "I'm still not sure what to think about you. The other Thawne had nice manners too; right up until the moment he shoved his hand through my chest after telling me I taught him what it was like to have a son." 

Eobard covers his own heart in sympathy. "I'm … sorry."

Cisco smiles at Eobard, but it's an uncertain expression; he gives Harry a pointed stare and just says, "Enjoy your burger" before he departs.

"Interesting young man," Eobard says with no small amount of sarcasm.

"He is. Brilliant, though."

"That doesn't surprise me. While not all doppelgangers are the same, there are consistencies."

Out of nowhere, Harry says, "My relationship with Cisco is ... complicated." 

Eobard can understand that. "No doubt he had a hard time learning to trust you, given what my doppelganger did to him."

"Just as I had a hard time trusting him." Harry's clearly begging Eobard to ask the question.

So Eobard does, and arches an eyebrow at him. "Why wouldn't you trust him?"

"Because Cisco's doppelganger on my Earth had helped kidnap my daughter."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry and Eobard have a heart-to-heart talk (of a sorts), over Big Belly Burger.

Harry hadn't expected to get such an easy opening, but he's not going to let it pass. "Have your dinner." He gestures at the Big Belly Burger bag.

"Are you sure? I have a delicate constitution and this story sounds rather traumatic." Thawne's tone is light, but the look in his eyes is dead serious.

"It's okay – all ends well." 

Thawne nods and takes out his meal. Harry watches as Thawne meticulously unwraps the burger, locates a plastic knife and cuts it in half, before wrapping the other half back up. That's something _he'd_ never do. Thawne must have noticed Harry's stare and says, "What?"

Harry's reminded of the bizarre conversation he had with HR, or more accurately, HR talking at him about tooth-brushing habits and being so curious about the differences between them. "Nothing."

Eobard takes a small, neat bite, wipes his mouth and says, "Well? Your daughter?"

Harry begins at the beginning, a confession of immense ego, near-criminal denial of responsibility, the rise of Zoom and how Zoom had gathered an army of metahumans to do his bidding. "One of his lieutenants was Vibe's doppelganger, Reverb, who snatched my daughter out of her college dorm and took her to Zoom."

Harry watches Thawne's expression, and he's not at all surprised at the wariness that has crept in. "Cisco said that my not-quite-doppelganger engineered an accident in the particle accelerator here. Did a particle accelerator accident create the metahumans on your world, too?"

"Yes – although the one on my Earth was a genuine accident. That's not what happened on yours? No particle accelerator?"

"No." Thawne doesn't elaborate.

"And you're not going to tell me what happened."

"Finish your story and I'll tell you mine."

"Fair enough." Harry gathers his thoughts. "About a week after Jesse had been taken, I discovered a wormhole in one of the sub-basements in my S.T.A.R. Labs – and how those wormholes where created is another ugly story – one that Cisco can tell you. When I couldn't find her on my own, I was able to use it to travel here, to see if I could get help in defeating Zoom and rescuing my daughter."

Thawne finally cracks a smile. "That's quite a leap of faith. And then to find that your best hope is a man who wore your enemy's face."

Harry nods. "It wasn't easy. And since they didn't trust me, I couldn't tell them that their counterparts on my Earth were evil."

"You haven't mentioned Barry Allen. Or the Flash."

"You're right." Harry doesn't like thinking about the man he'd known as Jay Garrick, the man who had the love and admiration of the people of Central City, the man who'd made him the villain of the story, and yet the man who'd been nothing more than a psychopathic murderer and speed addict.

"On my Earth, Barry Allen isn't the Flash. That Barry is a rather nerdy and awkward young man who can be remarkably brave in unexpected circumstances."

Thawne asks, because he wouldn't be Thawne if he didn't, "But what about the Flash? Or did your particle accelerator accident only create villains?"

"In retrospect, it seems that way." Harry sighs. "As for the Flash on my Earth? He was an incompetent boob, a grandstander and glory hound, useless in a crisis and did more harm than good."

"Really? I find that hard to believe." Thawne sips the shake and rubs at his eyes. "Sorry – brain freeze. It's funny – in all the worlds I've travelled to, I've met a few different men who are the Flash. Most of them are Barry Allen, but many of them are not. And regardless of who's actually under the mask, I've never met a Flash who was anything less than a perfect hero. I find it hard to believe that your Earth's Flash was as incompetent as you say he was."

"Believe it, Thawne. The man who was the Flash on my Earth was only pretending. The man under the hero's costume had really been the villain. He was Zoom, the bastard who took my daughter, who tried to destroy my city. Before the particle accelerator accident, Zoom had been Hunter Zolomon, a psychopathic serial killer. He'd been receiving electroshock therapy when the dark matter had been vented down, into the ground." 

Thawne doesn't say anything. He unwraps the other half of the burger and consumes it in three quick bites. 

"Nothing to say?" Harry hates the uncertainty that's crept into his tone, so far from his usual self-assured voice.

Thawne stares at him. "I have a lot to say, and none of it is complimentary."

Harry swallows and looks at his hands. "You're disappointed in me." He's kind of shocked at how much this man's opinion means to him, when he's rarely cared about anyone's opinion at all. Jesse, Barry, Cisco, Joe – how the hell did this Eobard Thawne get added into that very small, very select group? And in the space of an hour?

"Why didn't you own up to your mistake? Why did you deny that you were responsible for the metahumans on your world?"

It isn't so much Thawne's words, but the contempt in his tone that flays Harry. He feels himself flushing with shame. "At the time, I thought it was best. I'd contained the accident and hadn't made the correlation between the two events until weeks later. It had been too late by then."

"Bullshit. Is that an expression on this world?"

"It is. And you're right, my excuse is bullshit. I was a coward; I didn't want to admit I'd made a mistake and that that mistake had tragic consequences. No one had died that night, only a few people even knew that the accelerator had gone critical. It wasn't until a few weeks later, when the metahumans began wreaking havoc in my Central City that I understood the magnitude of the problem. I worked to protect my city until my daughter was kidnapped."

"And so you came here for help?"

"And I found it. These are good people here, good and kind and far more forgiving than I deserve."

"They seem to trust you now."

"It took a while." Harry finds himself in the strange position of wanting Thawne to think well of him. "I've been able to prove my worth to them."

"I still don't understand why you're advocating for me. Cisco has good reason to think of me as the embodiment of evil, and given what he's said outright and what he's hinted at, the rest of your merry little band feels the same."

Harry doesn't like being backed into a corner, but he can still feel the weight of the debt he's carrying. "In my desperation to get my daughter back alive, I had done something very stupid, something that hurt the people here very much. They locked me up for my crime. They could have sent me back to my world and shut the portal, they could have let me die, let my daughter die, my world die. But they didn't. They risked everything to help me, even after I betrayed them.

"When I hear to you talk about Barry, about Nora, about how you've been trying to find your husband and get home, I see myself in the same desperate position. I remember what it had been like when they told me that I wasn't going to have to go back alone, that they would help find my child and save my world. I've never been able to repay that – because what they'd done for me is what they'd do for anyone. I can't pay them back, but I can pay it forward."

Harry can't remember the last time he'd strung so many words together that hadn't been a prepared speech for a press conference or a presentation to shareholders. He also can't ever remember being so nervous about someone's reaction.

"A debt like that a hard thing to carry around." Thawne gives him that half-smile.

Harry lets go of a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. "I'm glad you understand."

"I do."

"But?" Harry's not going to delude himself with the hope that this Thawne – a man who seems worthy of his respect – is going to let him off so lightly.

"But nothing. You've already been judged and found wanting. You've paid for your sins and you're trying to make things right. This isn't my world; you haven't harmed me – unless you've poisoned my meal?" Thawne jokes and glances at the Big Belly Burger wrapper on the table.

Harry shakes his head. "No." He gives voice to an idle thought, "Is it possible to poison a speedster?"

Thawne chuckles. "I don't think so, but let's not try." Then he turns serious. "I do have a question, though."

"Ask away."

"You said that the Barry Allen on your world isn't the Flash. Cisco said that Barry Allen of this world became the Flash after the particle accelerator 'accident'. My question is where is this world's Barry Allen?"


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cisco is haunted, but at least his ghosts are familiar. It's a pity that familiarity doesn't make the migraines any easier to bear.

Cisco is getting a migraine. 

He feels it in the tension clustering at the back of his neck, in the aching tightness in his jaw, in the way his eyelids keep twitching. In another hour or so, he'll start getting halos and visual artifacts. It's not a side-effect of using his powers – Cynthia's training has eliminated those. This is something else, something relatively new, six months new in fact. They started the day after Barry said goodbye and walking into the Speed Force, disappearing forever into a prison of his own making.

Cisco thinks that the headaches are a by-product of stress and grief and a soul-aching loneliness, but he's never had them checked out, even though Caitlin's back with Team Flash. She knows about them, of course, but Cisco's always managed to put her off when she wants to run scans. He's just too afraid to find out that something's seriously wrong, that all this vibing is frying his brain. 

Instead, Cisco just wants to let the days take him until all the days are gone. His life _should_ be good; Cait's here and she's mostly Caitlin and not Killer Frost, Cynthia comes and goes with gratifying frequency. He has friends that are more like family to him than those of his blood, but there's a hole in his heart, one shaped like Barry Allen.

He just can't seem to get over the loss, it shadows him wherever he goes, whatever he does. 

It's not only here, in S.T.A.R. Labs, but throughout Central City. Barry's ghost is always following him around; a quiet haunting. It's a figment of his imagination, seeing Barry in his apartment, hovering behind him when Cisco's sitting on the couch; Barry stands next to him when Cisco's waiting for his coffee order at Jitters, when he tries to distract himself with a movie or a meal or a few drinks at some dive bar. He's everywhere and nowhere. The only time Cisco can't feel the haunting is when he's with Cynthia; that would be unbearable – to have his best friend watching him while he's trying to have a romantic moment.

HR haunts him too, but in different ways. HR is a happy voice in the back of his head, HR is wonder and fearlessness and big ideas that seem crazy. HR asks him why he's not trying to get Barry home and doesn't listen when Cisco says it's impossible.

_"Francisco, if there's something you've taught me; it's that nothing is impossible."_

That's HR's mantra, interrupting the few quiet moments he has, like now. He's hiding out in his workroom, unable to face Iris and Caitlin and Wally, unwilling to answer their questions about the man wearing Harry's face and bearing Thawne's name. The man who's so clearly _not_ the monster of him memories.

How can he tell them that this Thawne is married to his world's Barry Allen? That seems so bizarre and yet _not_. Barry and Thawne – his Barry, their own Thawne – had such a strange and intimate relationship. What would have happened if Thawne hadn't hated Barry? What if all of that concern, the subtle emotional investment, the obvious appreciation that Eobard Thawne had for Barry Allen, had been real?

Would it have been love? Could it have matured into something that that had solidified into a lifelong commitment between them? 

HR, his cheerful and verbose ghost, and an unabashed romantic, chuckles and says yes, most emphatically, complete with fist pumps and hearts and flowers and starts plotting out a dozen chapters in a novel he'll never get to write. Barry, silent and steady, is uninterested in the goings on of anyone and anything, just staring at Cisco with eyes filled with lightning.

"Guys, is it too much to ask for some privacy?" 

"Cisco?" Caitlin's at the door of his workroom. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah." Cisco slumps down in his chair.

"HR or Barry this time?" A few months ago, shortly after Caitlin had returned, her hair auburn and her eyes dark, they'd gotten drunk on tequila and he'd told her about his hauntings.

"Both." Cisco pulls at his hair and winces. Not a good thing to do with a migraine. Times like this, he wants to shave himself bald.

Caitlin sighs. "You can ask for help, you know."

He closes his eyes; Caitlin's right. Since Barry's been gone, Cisco's been reluctant to bring anything personal to anyone. He's closed himself off emotionally, functioning on mostly snark and autopilot. He sighs and whispers, "Cait? Please?"

She lays cool hands on his forehead, weaving her fingers through his hair, and the pain recedes. Cisco leans against Caitlin, grateful beyond measure, for the simple pleasure of her friendship. Last year hurt so much, he'd racked up loss after loss after loss. His mistakes had been nearly cataclysmic, cause by a spiral of grief and blame, lashing Barry for doing exactly what he'd told him to do the year before. And they'd never talked about it, they'd never had the chance to sit down and scrape away the scars and the scabs and let their friendship heal cleanly.

Maybe that's why Barry haunts him. 

Cisco shudders and the tears fall. Caitlin holds him and he can feel the warmth of her love sliding into all the cold places, reminding him that he's still alive for a reason.

"You okay?"

Cisco nods and lets her go, inelegantly wiping his nose with his shirtsleeve. "Yeah, I think so. Thanks."

Caitlin gives him that half-smile that's so familiar. "This is what friends do for each other. You don't have to carry this burden alone."

"I know. It's just – " 

Cisco doesn't have to say it. Caitlin's still so fragile, trying to weave back together the thread of her humanity; afraid if he leans too hard, he'll send her running. It would be so selfish to lean on Iris, who she carries her grief like a shield, keeping the rest of the world out as she does her best to save it. Wally, who's still trying to understand what it means to be a hero, can't carry Cisco's grief, too. He thinks of Joe, who's aged a decade in the last six months and bites his tongue every time Wally throws himself into danger, wondering if tonight is the night he's going to lose another son. How can Cisco ask Joe to share this pain when he's carrying so much of his own?

Cisco doesn't want to think about Harry, though. Because if he does, it means he'll need to think about this other Thawne and whatever relief Caitlin's just given him will be completely undone.

And it's undone anyway, because Caitlin asks, "So – what do you think of this other Eobard Thawne?"

Cisco blurts out, "He's married to Barry. His Barry. The Barry of his world." 

If he'd been expecting Caitlin's jaw to drop and see her get all flustered, he's bound for disappointment. Caitlin mulls over that interesting bit of information and tells him in her matter-of-fact doctor's voice that it's easy to see how that relationship makes sense.

Cisco fills Caitlin in on what Thawne had said back in the Pipeline cell, that he and his Barry had been separated and he's been hopping through dimensions trying to find him.

"How terribly sad. Do you think we can help him find his Barry?" Of course Caitlin's heart is soft. Of course she wants to help.

"Harry wants to." Cisco doesn't want to admit how much this Thawne's story had moved him.

"He does?"

"Yeah – I think he looks at Thawne and sees himself before we rescued Jesse." Harry hadn't said as much, but Cisco had noticed the expression on Harry's face when Harry ordered him to let Thawne out of the cell.

"And he wants to pay that forward." That is not a question but a statement of fact.

Despite his belief that this Thawne isn't a bad guy, Cisco snarks, "We might all get a hand through our hearts as a thank you present." He rubs at his chest and feels the headache start to envelop his whole face.

Caitlin sees something in his eyes and cups his face in her cool hands. 

This time, the trick doesn't work. "I think I might need something stronger."

Caitlin says gently, "That means you won't be able to hide out down here. I really do need to monitor you when I administer those drugs. They're strong and you've gotten sick after taking them."

Cisco had, but the relief had been worth the upchucking. 

"You know that means you're going to have to answer everyone's questions eventually."

Cisco sighs and gives in. "I guess."

Thankfully, the team sees that Cisco's in pain and leaves him be. In the med bay, Caitlin administers a strong anti-migraine drug and orders him onto the gurney. He's relaxing as the drugs kick in, just sleepy and not knocked out, when Joe pays a visit.

Joe, with a beard that's gone mostly gray, and bags under eyes, and his Dad-cop face on, is the world's most gentle interrogator. He asks "You doing okay?"

The migraine has eased back and Cisco's feeling more like a human being than overworked kettle drum. "Yeah. How are you?"

"As well as can be expected." Joe sighs. "Heard you had a hard day today. Morning fight with a nasty meta. And this afternoon …"

"We have a visitor." Cisco blurts out.

"Heard about that, too. He's locked up in the Pipeline?"

"Not anymore. He's with Harry, who thinks he's trustworthy."

Joe's eyebrows _almost_ meet his hairline. "Really? Why is that?"

"Because he's married to his world's Barry, who's been missing for the last six months. This Thawne's been bopping around the multiverse trying to find him."

Joe's dumbstruck expression really is worth the pain from the migraine, the slight dopiness from the drugs. "You're shitting me."

"Not in the least. Thawne even has proof. He played a holographic recording of Nora Allen's toast at their wedding for me and Harry. He has it built into his wedding band." Cisco would love to get his hands on that bit of tech.

Joe shakes his head and says what's become obvious, "Well, I guess that just because he's Thawne's doppelganger doesn't mean he's evil."

"He's a Wells, though. Not the original blond model."

"Really?"

"And he says that's the face he was born with." 

"You believe him?"

"Yeah, I do. And if his Earth is really distant from ours, it's really quite possible." Cisco remembers one of Stein's lectures about the multiverse. "I'm not even sure he's a time traveler, either." Just as details get fuzzy the further away you travel from your home dimension, the synchronicity of time does, too. Jessica had taught him that when she'd taken him on a retrieval mission and they found themselves in Old Kingdom Egypt.

"I want to talk to him. See for myself that he's really not evil."

"Good idea, but don't shoot him, okay?" Cisco doesn't say that it seems more plausible for an Eobard Thawne to be married to a Barry Allen than for an Eobard Thawne to not be evil. "Maybe it's like Jay Garrick being Henry Allen's doppelganger from Earth-3?"

Joe nods. "I still have a hard time wrapping my head around that one." He stands up. "Get some rest, you look like shit."

"Thanks a lot." He knows Joe's just worried.

Joe doesn't just pat Cisco on the shoulder and leave; he pulls out a blanket and drapes it over him. "I mean it. I'm not willing to lose you, too."

Cisco rolls over and mutters, "I'm not going anywhere, Joe."

"Not if I can help it."

Joe turns off the light and closes the door, giving Cisco the quiet he needs. It's a pity that Barry's still standing over him, watching him so silently with those lightning filled eyes.

At least HR is nowhere to be found.

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	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eo and Harry share a moment. The pulse rifle joins the conversation.

Eobard's repeats the question. "Where is this world's Barry Allen?" But he's afraid of Harry's answer. Afraid to hear that this world's Flash, and more importantly, this world's Barry Allen is dead.

"He's gone."

And with that, Eobard's heart breaks. He needs to know what happened. "How did he die?"

Harry corrects him. "He's not … dead. He's gone. Into the Speed Force and this time, we can't get him back."

The relief Eobard feels combines with the dread of what it means to be lost in the Speed Force and unsettles his stomach. The burger and shake he'd just consumed feel like that they want to revisit his mouth. He takes a deep breath everything falls back into place. "That's good. That he's not dead." Eobard know that it's not so good to be trapped in the Speed Force. That had happened to him once – the Trickster had tried to blow up Barry and Eobard had generated a speed vortex to contain the explosion. He'd miscalculated the timing – or the Trickster had lied (more likely) – and he'd thrown himself into the Speed Force to escape the explosion. 

And he couldn't get out.

The Speed Force had been place without time and form and meaning; Barry and Tremor had worked for weeks to pry him loose, and when he finally was free, it took a long while for Eobard to put himself back together.

"How did this happen? How did Barry get trapped?"

Harry gets up and fetches what looks like a bottle of scotch. "I know you can't get drunk but this conversation calls for something to polish down the rough edges of reality. Would you like some?"

Barry likes to tease Eobard about his finicky tastes, particularly when it comes to anything alcoholic. _"Just because I can't get intoxicated anymore doesn't mean I can't enjoy the nuances of a finely crafted scotch."_ But right now, Eobard wishes for the surcease even rotgut can provide. "Two fingers, please."

Harry hands him a glass and Eobard sniffs before taking a sip. It's not the precious seventy-five year old single malt he'd prefer, but it's not rotgut either. Unfortunately, the world doesn't take on a soft golden haze. He finishes the first glass and then a second and he's still wearing borrowed clothes and staring at his doppelganger, waiting for a proper explanation. 

"It didn't happen from a single event, but an accretion of them. Barry – our Barry – made a mistake and everything that'd happened began from that." Harry rubs at his eyes. "He was grieving – he'd seen Zoom murder his father, and made a decision from emotion, not from reason."

"That does sound a bit like the Barry Allen I know." _And love._ "What did he do?"

"He went back in time and stopped your doppelganger from murdering his mother, which changed everything. But something happened – I'm not sure what, and he ended up having to undo the change to the timeline." 

Harry's staring at him over the rim of his glass, and Eobard finds it unnerving. It's as if he's having a staring contest with himself. But Eobard doesn't flinch or surrender easily. "He found out things had changed when he came back."

"Yeah." Harry doesn't elaborate. Instead, he refills both of their glasses.

"Time travel is a very dangerous thing. Once you commit to changing the past, you can't undo that change to repair the future. But my question to you is, how could you let him go back in time and make such a monumental change in the first place?"

Oddly enough, it's Harry who breaks and looks away. "I wasn't here. I'd gone back to my own world after Barry had defeated Zoom. My daughter wanted – needed – to go home. I couldn't stay behind. And I had a big mess on my own world that needed cleaning up. I'd run away from my problems for too long. It was time to man up and fix the mess I created."

Eobard carefully puts the glass down. He'll shatter it if he doesn't. Intellectually, he can accept Harry's reasons, but emotionally, he wants to shove his hand through Harry's heart for abandoning someone who needed him. 

_"Stop it, Eo – you don't know anything about their relationship. Don't assume."_ Barry – the voice of his conscience – does an exceptional job of talking him off a murderous ledge.

"I've been told that your doppelganger's eyes turned red when he was in full murder mode." Harry's gotten up and is now holding the pulse rifle.

Eobard blinks. "My apologies. I have no intention of killing anyone."

"My relationship with Barry isn't like you with yours." Harry sits back down, but he still has the weapon trained on Eobard. As if Eobard can't outrun something quite so antiquated. 

"He still needed you."

"He has family, friends. A woman he loves very much. I would have been an unnecessary complication."

Everything clicks with that admission. "You love him."

Harry doesn't answer, but he doesn't look away.

"You love him and you thought you'd be noble and you left."

Harry tilts his head, submitting to the truth of Eobard's accusation. "That about sums it up."

"You're a fucking idiot."

"What would you have me do? Press my affections where they're not wanted?" Harry laughs; a bitter sound. "His relationship with your doppelganger was …" 

"What?" Eobard doesn't know what he wants to hear. It still sickens him to know that his doppelganger had murdered Barry's mother.

"Complicated. I'm not sure if it ever crossed the line from student and mentor and hero worship to something else before Barry found out the truth, but it could have. It would have been wrong for me to take advantage like that. And besides, I needed a hero, not a lover. My daughter's life was on the line."

Eobard feels the anger rise. Once again, there's the dichotomy between reason and emotion – yes, the life of one's child should be paramount. But … Barry. It hurts to think of any Barry so damaged and lost that he'd break time to try and fill the emptiness in his soul. "And his girlfriend?" Eobard tries not to sneer, "she couldn't give him what he needed?"

"I'm sure she tried. Iris has known Barry for almost his whole life. I don't think there's anyone who knows him better."

Ice forms in Eobard's veins, freezing him in terror. "Iris?"

"Iris West. Don't tell me, you know her doppelganger."

Eobard nods, and the ice turns as the lightning that drives him forward gathers. "Iris West is your Barry's girlfriend?" He's clinging to the threads of his control with everything he's got.

Harry must sense the dangers; he powers on that pulse rifle. "She's his fiancée, actually."

"Really?" Eobard doesn't bother to hide his skepticism. Hopefully he keeps his disgust hidden, but it seems he's not successful. 

Harry asks, "Really. Why does that bother you?"

Eobard gives Harry the unvarnished truth. "Because on my Earth, Iris West was the Dominatrix, and she'd help orchestrate an invasion that almost destroyed my world. She's responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of people and would have sold our world into slavery and genocidal madness. She killed her own father and brother. She's the reasons why I'm wandering the multiverse, trying to find my husband. The Iris West of my world is to me – " Eobard picks up the glass, finishes the scotch and vibrates his hand until the glass turns to dust, "what my doppelganger is to you. Irredeemably evil."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Sometimes Harry feels like his life is something out of one of those old movies that Cisco loves, the screwball comedies where people say the most outrageous things at the worst possible moment.

And it doesn't help that Harry's mildly sloshed. He'd matched Thawne glass for glass, which had been a stupid thing to do. Thawne's a speedster with a speeder's metabolism. And Harry Wells isn't a speedster. Not really.

Which is why he lets out a snort of laughter when Thawne calls Iris West irredeemably evil. No, wait, Iris West is the Dominatrix.

And unfortunately, Harry now cannot unsee Iris West in leather fetish gear. 

"What's so funny?" Thawne's annoyed.

"Nothing." Harry shakes his head and instantly regrets it. "Sorry, I'm usually not such a lightweight."

"Hmmm. That's good to know." Thawne paces around the room. "You still haven't finished explaining how your Barry got stuck in the Speed Force."

Harry wishes he was either slightly less, or considerably more drunk. "It's all kinds of fucked up and I'll probably get the details wrongs, but this is what I know." He explains Flashpoint and the changes that had been made to the timeline – and again, Thawne's eyes fill with lightning. Harry tamps down the fear and continues – much of what he knows is second hand, relayed by Cisco and Jesse – except for one memorable and probably ill-advised conversation with Barry – trying to explain the husks and Doctor Alchemy and finally Savitar. 

"Philosopher's Stone?" Thawne actually laughs at that.

"I know, I know. Someone's definitely lacking imagination. But it was actually a very clever thing – a Speed Force containment field. It held Savitar within the Speed Force, but existed outside of the Speed Force. Until Barry foolishly tossed it into the Speed Force, where it started to collapse. Savitar tricked another speedster into taking his place and escaped into the real world."

Thawne's expression is unreadable. Harry finishes the story, telling Thawne about Barry's accidental trip into the near future, his failed attempts to change that future, and the final reveal – that at some point, a future version of Barry, broken by grief, had created dozens of time remnants to try and defeat Savitar, only to learn, after returning to the present, that Savitar had actually been one of those time remnants.

"Which explains why he needed to kill Iris West in the first place."

"Yeah." Harry can't help but think that Savitar had actually been a bigger mind fuck that Hunter Zoloman pretending to be Jay Garrick pretending to be the Flash, when he really was Zoom.

"And you weren't here to help sort this stupidity out?"

Thawne's judgmental gaze and the weight of Harry's own guilt is crushing. "No, but one my doppelgangers was – the Earth-19 version." Harry frowns at the memory of that genial idiot. "He sacrificed himself for Iris. Had some interesting tech that made him look like her and sound like her. Savitar killed him instead."

"Which created a paradox." Thawne makes a sound that somewhere between disgust and appreciation. "And an empty pocket of energy within the Speed Force. That's rather a catastrophic problem. I take it that this is why your Barry is trapped in the Speed Force? Extricating him without the right energy replacement would be disastrous."

Harry nods.

"You need my help with this." Thawne isn't offering anything. He's making a statement of fact.

The snap back into sobriety is hard and painful and essential. "It's definitely a pleasure to talk with someone who doesn't need every single thing explained in detail." 

Thawne nods, but adds, "I'll want your help, too."

"Of course." Harry wonders just what he's signing himself – and the team – up for. The multiverse is infinite and he doesn't even know how Thawne and his Barry got separated. He pushes himself to his feet, feeling far too old for this shit. "Let me go brief the team."

Thawne starts to follow, but Harry bars the way. "No, it'll better if you stay here; let me warm them up to the idea."

Thawne looks like he's about to disagree but backs down. "You're right." He looks back towards the beds. "Mind if I get some sleep? It's been a difficult day, to say the least."

Harry lets out the breath he'd been holding. There's something about this man that makes him feel like he's playing with a tiger who's only pretending to domestication. "Help yourself." 

When Thawne turns towards the beds, Harry snags the yellow jacket and heads down to the Cortex. He meets Joe at the elevator bank. 

Of course, Joe being Joe, reaches for his gun.

"It's me."

"You sure?"

"Didn't Cisco mention the hair? Or the lack thereof?"

"The other you is bald?" Joe actually snorts, but at least he's no longer looking like he's prepared to shoot on sight.

"No, just shorn very close." Harry thinks about it. "It's kind of practical, actually, considering…"

"I keep telling that to Wally, but Wally's got to do his own thing." Joe, thankfully, doesn't say anything about Barry. Instead, he asks about Thawne's suit. "Why have you got that? Holding it hostage? And where is he?"

"In my quarters, sleeping."

Joe gives him a hard look. "You feel sorry for him." It's clear that Cisco told him about Thawne being married to his world's Barry Allen.

"I know what it's like, I know that desperation."

"And you're sure he's not conning you. The other one …" Joe has a look of self-disgust on his face. "He was very good at making people believe in him."

Harry understands. He'd been on the receiving end of too much fallout from the other Thawne's machinations. "I'm a good judge of character, Joe. At least I like to think so, and this one's not playing games." And perhaps it's time to clue Joe in on his thinking. "And I'm certain that he can help us get Barry back."

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	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Despite the migraine and the ghosts, Cisco steps up and takes control.

Despite the drugs, despite Joe's command, Cisco doesn't actually sleep. He enjoys the cool darkness and the knowledge that almost all of the people he cares about are on the other side of the door. HR's in the chair next to the bad and Barry's just standing there, silent as always. For some reason, right now, Cisco's glad to be haunted.

"I wish you were really here, Bar. But since you're not, I'll settle for this." 

With those words, Barry dissolves and Cisco feels the pain easing, the tension in the back of his neck starting to unwind.

There are voices coming from the Cortex, the words are indistinct but the emotions are clear. Harry's in there and he's pissing everyone off. _What else is new?_

 _"Hard hat Harry's at it again."_ Now HR's leaning against the wall, grinning and spinning his drumsticks. _"You probably should go stop them before someone gets hurt."_

Fighting against the migraine drug's effects, Cisco pushes off the blanket and eases himself off the gurney. He feels fragile, a post-headache sensation he's become accustomed to over the past six months. It'll pass in a couple of hours, but in the interim, Cisco moves with care, he'll try to avoid bright lights and loud noises and strong emotions. Except that whatever is going on in the Cortex is certainly going to involve bright lights, loud noises and _very_ strong emotions.

Cisco splashes some cool water on his face, finger-combs his hair and manages not to snag any knots, mentally girds his loins and goes forth into battle.

The argument, or whatever it is stops and everyone stares at him. Foolishly, Cisco asks, "What's going on?"

And those are the wrong words, because everyone starts talking at once. His brain wants to shut down, and he looks over his shoulder at the med bay. Barry's back and he's standing guard. HR's leaning against the wall, making a little shooing motion with the drumsticks. No, Cisco can't retreat, he can only go forward. 

But he can impose some order. "Harry – you, and only you – get to talk until I say otherwise." 

HR, who's now sitting cross-legged on Caitlin's console, gives him the thumbs up.

Cisco listens as Harry tells him what Thawne said, about _his_ Barry Allen being lost, about being able to help them get theirs out of the Speed Force. It seems almost too good to be true.

"So what's the problem? If this Thawne's not evil and he knows how to get our Barry out of the Speed Force without causing the end of the world, why not take him up on his offer?"

And like that, everyone starts shouting. Wally's voice is the loudest. "My sister's a dominatrix."

"What?" Cisco tugs at his ear, as if he's misheard.

Joe growls, Iris has her head buried in her hands and Caitlin just looks confused.

"Once again, Harry – you and only you – will explain. And for the love of everything good and holy in this world, speak softly and slowly."

Harry does and Cisco finally realizes that the raised voices from earlier hadn't been from anger, but humor – a not so gentle ribbing on Iris about her evil doppelganger.

He gives her a look of sympathy and mouths, _"been there, done that, already tossed the tee shirt"._

"Does anyone see a problem with having this probably-no-so-evil Thawne help us get Barry back?"

There's silence as the team collectively shakes their heads; Cisco knows he's feeling better because he adds without thinking, "Provided he doesn't go all Reverse-Flash-y on Iris when he sees her."

There's dead silence, HR is smirking, Barry's still expressionless, and Harry throws something at him. Cisco ducks and does his best to ignore the mild pounding in his head from the sudden movement.

His gaze is caught by a somewhat familiar bundle of yellow draped over a chair. Cisco goes to look at it, but he can't quite bring himself to touch it. "Harry, did you steal Thawne's suit?"

"Borrowed it. The self-cleaning function isn't working – Thawne thinks the scrubbers might have worn out from constant use." Harry, the bastard, is smirking worse than HR.

Cisco closes his eyes and says a prayer of thanks that the parish father would likely excommunicate him for. He takes a closer look at the jacket and starts seeing the details. The red and gold trim, how the black isn't really black, but a super-dark red – like the red from Barry's suit. He picks it up and flips open the front. The lining is definitely seen better days, but it's also kind of alive. It's not really electricity flowing through the fabric, but something like it.

It's both repelling and compelling and Cisco has to force himself to touch it. There's a tiny spark – like the static charge he gets in his hair on a cold winter day – and the "life" fades out.

"Did you see that?" Cisco turns to Harry.

"See what?"

"I don't know." Cisco strokes the lining again and it's just dense, sensor-laden fabric. "Think Thawne will kill me if I take a sample?"

"Probably." Harry's answer is a little too laconic. "I know I would. But I suspect, if you asked nicely, he'd let you take a piece. Or even give you the manufacturing specs."

"You're really gone on this guy, aren't you?"

Harry makes a face, but he gives Cisco a more than honest answer. "He's me – despite the name. Does it sound crazy?"

Cisco feels mildly envious. "You're lucky – all of your doppelgangers have been good guys – even the original Harrison Wells. The only doppelganger of mine that I met had been an insane megalomaniac." Suddenly something occurs to him; it feels like he's just been punched in the face. "You _knew_ Reverb. You looked at me and realized what I could be. You knew my doppelganger was a fucking evil nutcase and you thought I might be the same." He remembers the wanted posters on the wall of the Earth-2 forensics lab. Killer Frost, Deathstorm. _Reverb._ "That's why you were such a dick when you first got here."

"Reverb was the one who kidnapped Jesse from her dorm room." Harry busies himself with something on the workbench. "On Zoom's orders, of course. Because 'Jay' – " Harry actually made air quotes, "was too busy playing the tardy hero."

So much makes sense, now. "No wonder why you hated us. Hated me. No wonder why you were the one who picked up that I was a meta."

"Yeah." Harry still won't look at him.

Cisco rocks back on his heels. "Not all doppelgangers are the same, you know."

"It didn't take me long to realize that – maybe five minutes in the presence of your little collective of walking wounded. But I still couldn't trust you. Not with Jesse's life at stake."

There's no point in rehashing old battles, not when there are still new ones to fight. "So, you look at this Thawne and you really see yourself?"

"I see a man I could be." 

There's a pause and Cisco isn't quite sure what Harry means by that.

But then Harry adds, "I see a man I was for a space of time. So desperate and willing to do anything to get back what I'd lost that I made terrible mistakes. I'd like to help him avoid that, if I can."

"And it doesn't hurt that he's a genius scientist with his own S.T.A.R. Labs." 

"Nope, not at all." Harry cracks a smile. "It's actually kind of comforting. After HR …"

Out of the corner of his eye, Cisco sees HR's ghost sticking out his tongue at Harry. At least Barry's ghost is nowhere to be found.

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	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eobard has a moment of well-earned peace, before the inevitable all hell breaking loose in the Cortex.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about missing the posting yesterday.

Eobard can't remember the last time he's dreamed. Sleep – and by extension, dreaming – has been a rare and hard-won commodity during these last six months. Not that Eobard's ever been a man who required a lot of rest. Even during the early days of his career, or when he'd begun building S.T.A.R. Labs, he'd often pushed himself for days at a time, ignoring the advice of friends who insisted that going without sleep would take years off of his lifespan. 

Of course, in the life he'd enjoyed after meeting Barry, Eobard did spend quite a bit of time in bed, but not sleeping. Barry has the same allergy to sleep that Eobard does (and it's an effort these days to think of Barry in the present tense), and the late night, post-coital hours had been spent talking and learning about each other.

A year after their wedding, Barry and Eobard's lives had changed in ways no one could have ever dreamed of. A solar flare and a lightning storm activated dormant genetic mutations across the planet, redefining what it means to be human.

Now, Eobard and his husband are definitely not human anymore. Humans have finite lives, their cells age and die at a steady metabolic rate. Sleep and dreaming are mortal requirements, and speedsters are, for all intents and purposes, immortal. Nothing short of complete systemic trauma can kill them. 

But right now, pushed to his limits and given the blessing of a safe bed, Eobard needs to sleep, he _needs_ to dream. It's more than just the biological imperative. He needs to lose himself in memory, to have the space – for a short while – where he has his happiness and joy at hand. He needs to escape into a world that no longer exists, where his days are spent bettering humanity and his nights spent loving his husband.

And yet, he fights the need, sitting on the edge of the bed, almost afraid to stretch out and let himself sleep. What if he can't summon those dreams, what if he's caught in the nightmare of their separation, forced to relive the moment when Barry had been ripped from his arms?

His body and his mind are divorced from each other. He's afraid to give into sleep, but his body is demanding it.

With a sigh, Eobard toes off his borrowed footwear and stretches out on the bed. It's not particularly comfortable, but it just might be the first time he's felt safe enough to give into the vulnerability of sleep.

_"Eo, rest. I'll be here, waiting for you."_

Barry's voice is calm, so full of reason and in an instant, Eobard's mind is reconciled to the needs of his body and he eases into sleep.

And Eobard does dream, not the feared nightmare of pain and fear and blood, but a moment of perfect happiness.

_They are in their bedroom, several hours after they'd said their vows. Barry is still in his wedding tuxedo, but his heavy silk bow tie and the collar button are undone. This is not a relaxation of formality at the end of a long evening, but evidence that Eobard couldn't resist the opportunity to gently maul his new husband on the ride home from the reception hall. Eobard's own tie and shirt are equally mussed. In fact, his bow tie isn't around his neck, but instead almost fully tucked into Barry's trouser pocket._

_"A trophy," Barry had insisted when he'd slowly drawn it from Eobard's neck. "And perhaps an enticement?"_

_Even in the limousine, with a driver just a few feet away, Eobard couldn't help the flush of arousal. They'd not been shy about their likes and dislikes, although Barry's confession about how he loves being controlled during sex had been accompanied by a most charming blush. Now, those, there's no reason not to act on Barry's invitation._

_Except that it's their wedding night and Eobard wants something more. He claims Barry's neck wear, but gives him a promise. "Tomorrow, I'll tie you to the bed and make you beg until you can't remember your name, but tonight – "_

_He hears Barry's breath catch, he sees Barry's pupils dilate with desire. Barry swallows and licks his lips. "Tonight, Eo?"_

_"Tonight I want to worship you." Eobard cups Barry's cheek, sweeping his thumb over his husband's lips._

_"I'm not a god."_

_Eobard smiles, "You are, to me. You are everything to me, Barry. You are the alpha and omega of my existence. I love you beyond words."_

_Barry's trembling. "Eo – please."_

_Eobard loves how such a simple expression of love can make this strong, brilliant man so desperate. It's ironic that Barry had been the first to say "I love you," but Eobard is the one who finds it so much easier to say._

_He kisses Barry, keeping the need to devour his husband in check. He could have Barry on naked and on his back, out of his mind with desire, with little effort, but not tonight. Eobard really does want to worship Barry, he wants to show Barry how much he cherishes him, how much he honors him. And of course, how much he loves him._

_Eobard's hands shake – just a bit – as he eases the tuxedo jacket from Barry's shoulders, tossing it towards a chair in the corner of the room. From the sound the fabric makes, it's missed its mark and has landed on the floor. Barry laughs, a breathy sound. Perhaps on another night, Eobard might make a teasing comment about how not to treat fine tailoring, but not tonight._

_First, Eobard lifts Barry's wrists, undoing the cuff links. They are Thawne heirlooms, cabochon rubies set in soft yellow gold – an engagement present – and he carefully pockets them as he softly kisses the smooth skin, so warm and full of life. The shirt studs are equally precious, but they'll stay fixed on the shirt until laundering. Eobard slides his hand under the crisp cotton and rests it over Barry's heart._

_Barry leans back, his head on Eobard's shoulder, his hands arcing back on Eobard's hips, holding him close. "Tell me, Eo. Tell me what you're thinking."_

_"I love you." Eobard ghosts his lips over Barry's temple. "I love you so much that it terrifies me."_

_Barry turns in his arms, his expression worried. "Why? When I think how much I love you, I'm fearless. I feel like I can do anything because I love you."_

_Eobard presses his forehead against Barry's. "I'm sorry – I'm not so articulate tonight."_

_"Too much champagne?" Barry tries to lighten the mood._

_"Too much emotion, maybe?" Eobard has to be honest right now. "Watching you walk up the aisle, saying our vows, the moment you put your ring on my hand, when I put my ring on yours. I never expected this. I never expected love."_

_Barry presses a soft kiss against Eobard's lips. "And now that you have it?"_

_"I will burn the world down if anyone tries to take you from me." Eobard can't keep the fierceness out of his voice. "That's what terrifies me."_

_Barry kisses him again, harder. "Good, because if anyone tries to take you from me, it would be the same. You are mine, Eobard Thawne, and I will allow no one to take you from me." Barry's eyes are glowing, as if they're filled with lightning. "I love you."_

_Instead of fighting the emotion, Eobard lets it ride through him. He kisses Barry, pouring all of the joy – the terror – into it. And Barry gives as good as he gets, nipping at Eobard's lips as he frees Eobard from his formal wear._

_All thoughts of gently worshiping Barry, of going slowly, of making this a wedding night out of some clichéd romantic movie, vanish when Barry's hands find their way under Eobard's shirt. Barry clutches at him, his hands hard and hot, his mouth demanding. "Fuck me, Eo. I'm not a fragile princess you need to woo. Fuck me and make me forget everything except that I'm anything but yours."_

_Eobard laughs into Barry's kiss. "I'll admit that the wooing is done, but I'm still going to worship you like you deserve."_

_He's got Barry's trousers open and as he pushes them down, Eobard drops to his knees, a position he's never taken with Barry._

_And Barry's all too aware of the significance, as he tries to pull him up. "Eo – "_

_"Shhh, let me. Please." Eobard captures Barry's gaze as he nuzzles at Barry's cock. "I told you, I want to worship you. Let me."_

_Barry nods and his assent heightens his arousal – his cock gets harder and hotter against Eobard's cheek._

_But Eobard takes his time – he does as he's promised and worships every part of Barry, dedicating himself to his husband's pleasure._

_Barry's fingers weave through Eobard's hair, his nails delicately scraping against Eobard's scalp as Eobard dedicates himself to giving pleasure. Barry's fingers tighten on Eobard's hair …_

And Eobard wakes up.

His face is wet with tears and his body aches with dream-induced desire, which dissipates as Eobard takes stock of his reality. He's in borrowed clothes, his mouth dry, he's on a cot in a converted laboratory in a S.T.A.R. Labs that's certainly not his own, even in the wildest flights of fantasy – or worst nightmare.

Lingering here will be a mistake; the only way he'll find Barry is to keep moving. Eobard's promised to help his benefactor get _his_ Barry back; hopefully that assistance will be paid back. Perhaps Tremor's doppelganger will open a portal to an adjacent universe so Eobard can continue his quest without depleting his energy.

_Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps..._ Eobard's not going to put any faith in a stranger's promises, even if that stranger is wearing his face. But he can't leave just yet. They have his emblem – it's not just a pretty piece of decoration. It controls every system in the suit. And more than that, it's also the only way he'll be able to find Barry.

And speaking of his suit, Harry seems to have absconded with his jacket. Which doesn't surprise Eobard, given the interest Harry had in the cleaning system. He hopes the team here has the right tech to get those scrubbers back on line, if it's even possible. The lining is months past its usable lifespan.

Perhaps, if this team can't help him find Barry, they'll help him get home. Give him a chance to regroup, to repair what needs to be fixed, gather his own forces and start the search again. Except that feels like cheating.

_"Don't be silly, Eo. Taking care of yourself isn't cheating. It's the smart thing to do. You should have tried to get home first. Made sure you were equipped to do this right."_

Barry's right – or he would be if it was actually Barry talking to him and not the avatar of his self-indulgent conscience.

_"Self-indulgent? I'm hurt._

Eobard smiles, he can actually hear the pout in that voice. "Okay, okay." He finds the borrowed sneakers and goes to locate his benefactor and a bunch of people who'd likely shoot him than offer him help.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eo feels.
> 
> Cisco feels.
> 
> Harry feels.
> 
> It's all about the feelings.

This version of S.T.A.R. Labs is disturbing. There's a sense of incompletion here – as if much of the structure was never put to its intended use. And there's so much damage – some must be from the particle accelerator accident, but there's other decay that looks fairly recent. Eobard's not sure if he wants the whole story.

Even with the damage and the blocked off corridors, it doesn't Eobard take long to locate Harry and Cisco and the rest of their allies. Despite the decay, despite the damage, it's still S.T.A.R. Labs and it follows the same pattern as his own creation – different lab segments leading to a centralized operations facility. 

He pauses at the doorway and observes. 

Eobard can hear Cisco and Harry talking – they are out of his line of sight. But the people he can see have faces he recognizes – Caitlin Snow, Wallace West and his father, Joseph. And Iris West.

Eobard's reluctant to disturb the scene. While he has a visceral and unpleasant reaction to the Dominatrix's doppelganger that he immediately packs away, it is good to see Joseph again – even though this one isn't _his_ Joseph. The one he knew, the one who'd been as close as a brother when Eobard had started building S.T.A.R. Labs, had been a medical doctor and an exobiologist – not a police detective, if the gold shield on his belt has the same meaning here as it does in his own universe.

But it's Wallace who spots him standing in the doorway. "Geez, you look weird without the hair."

Eobard blinks – this is not the greeting he'd expected. "Sorry?"

Caitlin Snow elbows Wallace and is the first to approach him, pulling him into the room. "Doctor Thawne, right?"

Eobard nods and holds out his hand. "Doctor Snow?" 

He's rewarding with a cool handshake and a warm smile. "I guess some things are constant in the multiverse."

"You're an astrophysicist here, too?"

Snow laughs and shakes her head. "And I guess I'm wrong about the constants. I'm a medical doctor – my specialty is biogenetics."

"Ahh." Eobard feels a little at sea and very conscious of everyone's eyes on him. "You knew my not-quite-doppelganger?"

"Yeah." Snow scrunches up her face. "He wasn't such a good guy. But as we've just agreed, not all doppelgangers are the same."

Eobard nods and looks around the room. Joseph is giving him the stinkeye, but Wallace is grinning at him; there's a comfort in that familiarity. Harry and Cisco look like their waiting for something to explode.

And then there's Iris West. 

She's younger than her doppelganger; or perhaps villainy has a way of aging people. Younger, softer, prettier. But it's clear that she's also a woman in charge, and oddly enough, there is something this Iris West reminds Eobard of Nora Allen when he'd first met her – a benevolent and implacable monarch, ruling with a fierce kindness. Everything that his world's Iris West had wanted, but could never achieve – so she'd ended up trying to destroy the world, instead.

It's clear that Harry's told them about the Dominatrix. Joseph is in full father-protective mode, fairly bristling at Eobard. And while Wallace is smiling, he's also in position to block any hostile moves. 

Wallace is also a speedster; Eobard can tell from the way the Speed Force clings to him. That's most interesting. 

And at the moment, not relevant. 

Eobard knows that if he wants to enlist the help of these people, he's going to have to acknowledge Iris' primacy. He approaches with caution. "Ms. West."

She lifts her chin and steps away from the protection of her family. "Doctor Thawne. Eobard Thawne."

"I understand that my name is not one that's welcome here." Eobard says, striving for humor in a delicate situation.

Iris isn't smiling as she replies, "And I've been told that I'm something of a patricidal, fratricidal mass murderer on your world." 

Eobard corrects her. "Not you – your doppelganger. It's never a good idea to conflate yourself someone who might bear your face or name, whether that person's a hero or a villain."

Iris nods. "It's still a difficult thing to hears, that there's someone out there – " She flings her hand out, "who has my name, my face, but has done terrible things."

"Yes, it is."

"Now I know how Harry felt when he first arrived. And I guess that's how you must feel, too."

Eobard nods. "It was a difficult thing to learn that my doppelganger killed people, killed the doppelganger of someone I care about very much. That he deliberately hurt someone – the doppelganger – of someone I love more than my own life." Eobard locks eyes with Iris, he needs to see her reaction.

She doesn't flinch. "He said he loved Barry, but that he hated him, too. Pretty fucked up, isn't it?"

"I imagine that it's not a difficult thing to love your Barry Allen."

Iris rewards him with a smile. "No, it isn't. Not at all."

"Then we have something in common. Two things, actually."

She nods. "We both love our Barrys and we've both lost them."

Eobard hold out his hand. "Then why don't we work together and do our best to get them back?"

"You have a deal, Doctor Thawne."

Eobard can't help himself; he bows a little over Iris West's hand. "Thank you."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Harry holds his breath as he watches the exchange between Thawne and Iris. He'd figured that Thawne would be polite and maintain some distance from Iris, perhaps use him and Cisco as buffers. But of course Thawne doesn't. He walks right up to the woman who shares a face with his greatest enemy and practically bows to her.

"You okay?" Cisco nudges at him. "What are you thinking?"

"Not sure, honestly." He tracks Thawne as his doppelganger makes his way around the Cortex, how he's interacting with Joe and Wally, with Caitlin – he can't hear what they're saying, but he can observe. Thawne's posture is relaxed, but dominant. Thawne's not trying to take over, but he's definitely asserting control. It comes as natural to him as breathing. Harry has to wonder if there's a military background there – perhaps that's another similarity between them.

To Harry's surprise, Joe actually claps Thawne on the shoulder and they share a laugh, as if they're now the best of friends. To Harry's greater surprise, he feels a nasty sting of jealousy and he's not sure exactly who he's jealous of – Thawne for getting such a warm greeting from Joe, or Joe for warming up to Thawne so easily.

Thawne turns to him and smiles, and Harry just feels weird, watching his doppelganger lope over to him like a well-fed tiger. He's about to ask Thawne if he slept well when Thawne turns to Cisco and sees him holding the jacket to the Yellow Horror. He holds out his hand and Cisco surrenders it, visibly reluctant.

"Ah, that's where it went."

"I took it." Harry shoves his hands in his pockets. It's either that or put them up behind his neck.

"I figured that. It does a lot of things, but getting up and walking out isn't one of them."

"It needs the pants to do that, right?" Harry snaps back.

Thawne gives him the stink-eye. "It would have been nice if you asked, first.

"It's easier to ask for forgiveness than to request permission." Harry doesn't remember who originally said that, but it had been something he'd learned the hard way more than twenty-five years ago when he'd taken a squad of troopers into a battle without a direct order and ended up saving the day. A commanding officer had told him that if he ever did that again, he'd end up court-martialed, regardless of the medal of valor they'd just pinned to his chest.

"And you're not going to ask for forgiveness, are you?" Thawne raises an eyebrow at him. 

It feels like Thawne's playing a deep game, one that Harry doesn't really want to join. So he shrugs and says, "Fuck off." He needs something from Cisco's workroom. He needs to escape for a bit because he doesn't want to see this man charm his way into the team, see Cisco go from wary to enthusiastic, see Caitlin and Wally and Joe and Iris practically fawn over Thawne, like he's the promised messiah.

Except that's exactly what Eobard Thawne is. He's going to do what Harrison Wells, despite all of his genius, has been unable – and perhaps unwilling – to do. Thawne's going to rescue Barry Allen from the Speed Force, but in such a way that reality won't explode on them.

Harry drifts around Cisco's lab, looking for a problem that he can actually solve. Two years ago, when he'd struggled to find Jesse, to rescue her, he barely slept, living on adrenaline and caffeine and fear. But when Barry had walked into the Speed Force, taking part of Harry's soul with him, Harry had been _resigned_. This was something Barry had to do, a penance he'd called it. Barry knew he couldn't come back and so he'd said his goodbyes.

And Harry had – like the team – accepted the new reality. Over the last six months, he'd made some half-hearted stabs at a solution, but he hadn't put any real thought into it. Barry was gone and he would stay gone because otherwise the world would end.

Talking with Thawne, seeing the man's desperation, Harry feels somewhat less. Less of a genius, less of a friend. Less of a man who nurtures something in the secret parts of himself that could be called love if it isn't so selfish.

"Caitlin's gone home and so have the Wests. Joe and Iris are exhausted." Cisco comes in and starts reorganizing the stuff on the workbench, trying not to look all that invested in anything.

"I'd imagine that Iris is a bit creeped out by Thawne."

"And vice-versa. He was kind of gallant to her at first, but it's pretty clear that she unnerves him."

Harry nods. He's kind of exhausted, too. 

Cisco looks at him, worry written all over his face. "You doing okay?"

"I'm fine. Just fine." He's not, but it's not like Harrison Wells is going to admit that to anyone, let alone his bête noir, Cisco Ramon.

"Doesn't look that way. You look pissed. Like a cat that's just gotten caught in the rain."

"I'm fine, Ramon." He turns his back on Cisco and picks up a broken phase multiplier.

"Then why are you hiding down here?"

"I'm not hiding. I needed something." Harry hopes he doesn't sound like a petulant twelve year old.

"What? Maybe I can help you find it."

Harry grinds his teeth and wishes for the old days, when he could just snap an insult at Cisco that would send him running. But those days are long gone. "I – I just need a little distance, okay?"

"Why?"

Harry tosses down the broken bit of tech. "It's not important."

"I think it is." Cisco's nothing if not persistent. "You were the one who wanted him out of the Pipeline. Are you regretting that decision."

"No, not really."

"Then what is it?" Cisco stands next to him, leaning against the work table like nothing matters. "You know you can trust me, right?"

"It's stupid, really." Harry starts fiddling with a half-completed inter-dimensional alignment modulator – or that's what it looks like. Cisco snatches it out of his hand.

"You're jealous." 

Harry stares at Cisco, jaw open. But there's absolutely no judgment in that statement and Cisco looks … sympathetic. 

"It's why you wouldn't give HR the time of day. You earned a place here and you don't like feeling that you've been usurped."

Harry still can't make words come out of his mouth.

"That's why you disliked Jay – well, Hunter – too. He was a 'good guy' – helpful, smart, without a lot of baggage. Except that he was a lying psychopathic murderer intent on universal domination."

Harry finally finds his voice. "Yeah. But it's stupid. I'm a grown man. What the hell have I got to be jealous for?"

Cisco shrugs. "Sometimes feelings aren't rational, Harry. Sometimes we hurt and lash out and run and hide because we can't deal with them."

"That's what children do. I'm not a child."

"Could have fooled me." Cisco bumps his shoulder. "That Thawne up there – while he's not Doctor Evil, he's not you. And I wouldn't want him to be. There's might be a billion Harrison Wells – and some of them could actually be called Eobard Thawne – but there's only one Harry Wells. One you – only one Harry Wells that I can count on to make me want to tear my hair own on a daily basis and only one Harry Wells that I trust will save the day."

Harry will not let his feeling show. No, he will _not_. "What about HR?"

"HR was someone completely different, too." Cisco sighs. "It's not a competition, Harry, and stop sulking. That guy upstairs can help us get Barry out of the Speed Force without destroying the universe."

"I should have done that already." The guilt tastes foul in his mouth. "I nearly destroyed everything to get Jesse back, but I've done next to nothing for Barry."

"Join the club." 

"Don't lie to me, Cisco." Harry picks up the inter-dimensional alignment modulator. "What about this? Or this?" He touches the broken phase multiplier. "You've been trying to figure out how to rescue Barry. All of this – " Harry gestures at the accumulated tech on the workbench, "is evidence of your efforts."

"And they're all half-baked ideas, Harry. Nothing concrete. Nothing that's going to solve the problem."

"But you haven't given up."

"Nor have you."

Harry drags a hand through his hair. "Maybe I have. Maybe I'm just too scared to fail."

"Or maybe you're too scared you'll succeed."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Maybe you're afraid of what Barry will be like if you get him out of the Speed Force." Cisco bites his lip. "Or maybe I'm projecting."

Harry lets out a deep sigh. "No, Cisco. You're not projecting at all."

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eobard and Harry start working on a way to pry Barry loose from the Speed Force. And Cisco sends out a message for assistance.

A few minutes after Cisco goes to find Harry, the Wests and Snow depart for home, and Eobard is relieved. While this world's Iris West seems like a lovely, intelligent and caring woman, she still unnerves him. And so do the Wests, father and son. 

His world's Joseph West had been a very close friend. They'd met as housemates when Eobard had been working on his second doctorate and Joe had been started med school. Joe had been a fun, out-going guy who didn't believe in taking life seriously. He'd latched onto Eobard like a barnacle and refused to let him bury himself in his work. He had taught Eobard how to live a life, and when Eobard had started S.T.A.R. Labs, Joseph came on board as Employee Number Two. Before he died, Joseph had been S.T.A.R. Labs' Chief Medical Officer and the world's premier exobiologist. His younger child, Wallace, had followed in his father's footsteps and had gone to medical school, and then into bio-genetic research. Ironically, Wallace West had been the lead researcher on the S.T.A.R. Labs Enhanced Human Genetics project before thirteen percent of the world's population spontaneously mutated. He's been deeply fond of his friend's son and still grieves for his loss.

Being in the same room with the Wests, with people who share the faces and names of his closest friends and most hated enemy, is difficult and he's grateful for their departure. He also understands why Caitlin Snow left, too - given what Harry had shared about _his_ doppelganger.

But as relieved as he is by the absence of people who are so disturbing, Eobard is also a bit, well, peeved. He's here to help this group solve the problem of getting their Barry out of the speed force, and every moment he wastes, waiting for them, is a moment he could be spending looking for _his_ Barry. But he can't proceed without Harry and Cisco. He thinks about searching for them, which seems ridiculous, since they both wanted to be alone. He goes over to one of the command consoles, hoping it's biometrically controlled. It is, but it also needs a password, which Eobard doesn't have. He could start speed-entering data, but without the password parameters, he's more than likely to blow up the system than get access.

In an attempt to use the time productively, Eobard heads into a very well equipped lab off of the main chamber and finds a host of testing equipment. Although Harry hasn't returned his emblem yet, he can start work on repairing his suit. To Eobard's relief, there's enough residual energy in the lining to enable a decent sensor test. Unfortunately, the test results aren't good. There's no way he'll be able to bring the scrubbers back on line. Eobard can live with the funk from a dirty suit, but he's got a bigger problem. The speed energy storage units, which are critical for interdimensional travel, are down to seven percent capacity. 

He wonders if the tech here is sufficient to rebuild those storage units. The alternative is to hope that Vibe can lock onto his home dimension and open a portal. But Eobard's reluctant to do that – it means starting over in his search for his husband, hopping through the multiverse, revisiting worlds he's already been to. Even with Tremor's help, the thought of starting from scratch is heartbreaking.

Eobard collapses onto a lab stool and buries his face in his hands. He needs his husband back and by his side, he needs to hear Barry's voice for real, not just in his memories or his imagination. He needs to feel his husband's hands on him, he needs to hold Barry and tell him how much he loves him, how proud he is that he's Barry's husband, that he is a complete person only with Barry at his side.

"Thawne, you okay?" 

Eobard looks up and finds both Cisco and Harry staring at him.

"Just a little overwhelmed, to tell the truth." He needs to change the subject and turns their attention to the suit. "This is all but done for. I'm going to need some help." Eobard explains the problem.

"Do you have the specs?" Cisco asks. "Because if you do, we might be able to manufacture the material. And if we can't do it here, I’m sure that Harry's version of S.T.A.R. Labs could handle it."

"It's a good thought, but no – I don't carry the specs. Not even in my emblem." Eobard holds out his hand. "And I'd like that back, please."

Harry makes a face and pulls the emblem out of his pocket. "I hope you'll give me a better chance to look at it. I'm intrigued by the control systems and the wide band comms you've got there."

"Of course." Eobard traces the lightning bolt sigil with this thumb. "The problem is, I'm dead in the water if I can't get my suit operational. I need the stored energy to hop dimensions sequentially. If I just use my speed, I’ll just wind up in random universes."

"That's why you can't get home?" Cisco gives him a curious look. 

Eobard nods. "And even if I could get home, I wouldn't go. I have a feeling my home universe is very distant from this one. If I went home, I'd need to start my search from the beginning."

Cisco's now grinning like he knows a secret and Harry's smile is equally disturbing when he asks, "Is there any reason why you can't call home and get some help?"

"I would if I could. This lets me connect briefly with my Cisco when I'm in transit." Eobard holds up the emblem, "but we don't stay connected long enough to share anything but the most basic information. I know that my husband's still missing, my mother-in-law is holding my company together, and my world is still putting itself back together after the Dominators were sent packing. But that's it."

"What if you _could_ phone home?" Harry looks smug now. "What if we could dial in your vibrational signature and send a targeted message. Would your team be able to capture it?"

Eobard can't quite believe the offer of hope that's just been extended. "Of course they could capture it. Cisco's always listening for me. You have an interdimensional communications system?" Eobard looks around the facility, with evidence of decay everywhere. He can't contain his skepticism.

Cisco doesn't take offense. "Yeah, this place might look a little worse for wear, but it's like a barnacle-covered oyster, filled with plenty of shiny pearls. We've got an interdimensional communications system just waiting for your vibrational signature. We can get a message to your version of me and he can come pay a visit, or if not, send back the data you need. Or you can go home and then come back, it's up to you."

As seductive as that last offer is, to see his family and friends, he can't accept it. He promised himself that he wouldn't go home unless he had Barry with him.

"Let's go with Option A. Do you have a lancet?"

Cisco heads into the med bay and a few moments later comes back with a tiny sterile blade and a few alcohol wipes. Eobard cleans the back of his emblem and then his finger before drawing out a drop of blood. Without needing any instruction, Harry has a handheld sensor at the ready. The blood unlocks the data sequencer and a few heartbeats later, the sensor's captured his vibrational signature.

Cisco takes the output and starts his computations. "This will take a few minutes."

Eobard isn't impressed at the available computational power, and Cisco notices his expression. "Normally, we'd have about twenty-nine petaflops going, but there have been some … issues."

"Understood." Eobard didn't need further explanation. 

Despite the issues with the computing systems, it doesn't take more than a minute until there's a ping from Cisco's console signifying the completion of the process. "Well?"

"We have a winner. It looks like you are from Earth-52."

"That's from your perspective. I'm from Earth-1 - this would be Earth-52 from my perspective."

That earns a sharp “Ha, you wish,” from Cisco 

Harry explains, "Don't try to argue - someone once made the mistake of telling Cisco that this is Earth-Prime and the center of the multiverse and he refuses to think that he's wrong."

Cisco doesn’t belabor the point. "So, now that we have a key to your front door, so to speak, what do you want to do?"

"I need my version of you, Cisco. I need you to send him a message." Eobard grabs a notepad and write out instructions, and just before he hands it to Cisco, he adds one more item to the list, smiling.

Cisco reads it. "Dude, you sure about this?"

"I'm sure."

Eobard follows Harry and Cisco through the decaying building and they seem to be back in the chamber where Eobard had arrived. Harry pulls something out from a storage closet, something that looks like an ancient movie version of a ray gun.

"Seriously?"

"It's his aesthetic, Thawne – early Warner Brothers cartoons." Cisco snarks.

Harry just snorts in shared amusement. 

Eobard doesn't have a frame of reference for that, so he just says, "As long as it works."

Cisco puts on a set of modified glasses; Tremor has something similar to augment his powers. The actual transmission is rather anticlimactic. Cisco opens the portal, Harry turns on his device, which presumably transmits the message and Cisco shuts the portal down.

"That's it?"

"That's it. Unless I was locked into the wrong universe, that is." Cisco gives him a sly grin. "You might not get your cookies if that happened."

"Cookies?" Harry looks at Eobard, thoroughly confused.

"It's kind of a code, so my Cisco knows the message is really from me."

"And what does 'cookies' actually mean?" Cisco folds his arms across his chest.

Eobard laughs, "Cookies actually means cookies. My close associates – like your counterpart – know about addiction to Nora Allen's double-chocolate fudge cookies."

"Right – that holo-vid from your wedding, Barry's mother said something about cookies."

Eobard automatically reaches for his wedding band. "Yeah." He lets go and asks, “What now?"

Harry closes down his ray-gun device. "Now, we wait."

"Hopefully, not for long, although time seems to run a little differently here."

Cisco gives him a concerned look, "What do you mean?" 

"Harry's my age and so is Joseph West, but here, his children are younger than their counterparts. So are you – about eight years, I'd say. I'd venture that your Barry Allen is in his mid-twenties, not mid-thirties."

"Yeah. That's really strange." Cisco scratches his chin and contemplates the problem.

"Or is it?" Harry asks. "This Thawne isn't a time-traveler. He's my genetic counterpart, which he's not supposed to be – if what happens on this Earth is a template for all other Earths."

"But we do know there are differences – like there are no counterparts for us on Kara's Earth. That's Earth-38, so pretty distant." Cisco muses. "The further away you get, the more differences there are."

"That's very true. But who's Kara?" Eobard feels like he's missing an important piece of information.

Cisco fills him in. "A super-powered alien woman who fights for equality, truth, and justice. Very helpful when we were fighting the Dominators here."

"Ah." Eobard couldn't think of anything else to say.

"While we're waiting, any chance you'll share with the class how you became a speedster? Harry said you didn't have a particle accelerator blow up in your face to trigger the mutation." 

Eobard looks over at Harry, who gives him an all-too-familiar shrug.

"The mutation was caused by solar flares that lasted for a week, followed by a coronal mass ejection that caused an almost world-wide lightning storm." Eobard finds he can't be quite as sanguine about the event as he used to be. "Barry and I were monitoring the systems at S.T.A.R. Labs when the building took multiple strikes and the shielding failed. Barry took a direct hit. I – " He takes a deep breath, "reached out to pull him to safety and was caught in the current as it went to earth." Eobard lets out a shuddering breath. "We were comatose for nine months."

Cisco nods, as if the story is familiar enough. "And when you woke up, you were both speedsters?" 

Eobard nods. "The irony was that one of my pet projects had been genetic augmentation – redefining what it means to be human. I'd been looking into the nature of speed and its effects on the body when the flares hit and all my research - my team's work - became moot." He sighs and remembers how hard Joe and Wallace had worked, how close they'd been to developing a controlled mutation technology. He has to put his grief away.

"How about getting some work done on your problem - retrieving your Barry from the Speed Force? It might be a few hours before we get a response."

They return to the Cortex and Eobard gets back to business. "So, what do you know about this Speed Force prison that you Barry's trapped it?"

Cisco reiterates what Harry had told him, about the unfortunately named Philosopher's Stone.

"What was it made of? What was the physical nature of it"

Cisco makes a face, his frustration clear. "We really don't know. I was never able to get any concrete data on it. It did weird things – played mind games with us to get us to do what it – or Savitar – wanted."

"Mind games?"

"Made us see things – people – who'd died." Cisco buries his face in his hands. "It created illusions. Ghosts." Cisco laughs and seems bitterly amused by that. "Julian – who was the one to actually unearth the thing – said he was haunted by his sister, who told him where to find the stone. I was haunted by my brother. And Wally – poor kid, he was haunted by his mother."

"What was the point?"

"It wanted us to do something. To help Savitar get free from the prison he was in."

Eobard's not sure what to make of that and asks Cisco, "You're saying that the stone itself contained Savitar? That means it was a physical pocket of the Speed Force. How was it made?"

"We still don't know. It's all kinds of paradoxical mind-fuckery. In the original Flashpoint timeline, but several years in the future, Barry recruited a scientist named Tracy Brand. She was able to create a weapon that captured Savitar in the stone and somehow transported it into the past. It got buried in an ancient Hindu temple that Julian had discovered. When we were trying to stop Savitar from killing Iris, Barry travelled to the future to find out how his future self had dealt with Savitar. That future Barry gave him Tracy's name, and we were able to get her to help us. But her solution – the Speed Force Bazooka – didn't work. So we really don't know how this physical pocket of Speed Force had been created." Cisco shoved his hands in his pockets and gave Eobard a look of utter self-disgust.

"Mind-fuck, indeed." Eobard looks over at Harry, hoping for a better answer.

And Harry just says, "I wasn't here, I can't help."

Eobard isn't surprised and he holds his tongue. But Harry still flushes a dark red; it was clear he heard the unspoken rebuke, _"But you should have been."_

Eobard will deal with Harry's dereliction of duty another time. "Okay – this weapon. Do you have the schematics? Maybe I can figure out what went wrong."

Cisco asks, "What good will those do? It's not like we have a spare speedster to trap with it. Or an energy source to power it." 

"I'm thinking that you don't need a speedster but a speedster's energy. Speed expressed and encapsulated – the exact quantity to match Barry's Speed Force signature."

"We've, ah – experimented – with speed extraction." Harry's tone is troubled, troubling. "It becomes a permanent loss."

"Well, this wouldn't be extraction. Expression – like lactation." Eobard doesn't understand why everyone looks so confused. "Don't you know how to capture excess speed and recycle it?" Everyone looks at him like he's grown another head. "You let all of that energy just go to waste?"

"We're always trying to get Barry and Wally to go faster. They're never quite fast enough."

Eobard's grateful that Cisco speaks of multiple speedsters, remembering to include Barry. But he's still missing some key information. "What's Barry's baseline?"

"His baseline?"

"Yes – when he's running without effort, his cruising speed."

Harry pulls up some stats, "Barry's baseline is about twenty-three hundred miles per hour and he can sprint to twice that under the right circumstances." 

"Miles?" Eobard's not familiar with that measurement.

"Kilometers?"

He shakes his head. "Speed of sound – that should be a constant here. How many times the speed of sound at sea level?"

"A little more than three for Barry's baseline, six in a sprint." Harry gives him a curious look. "What's yours?"

Eobard feels unaccountably embarrassed when he says, "Eighteen."

"With or without tachyon enhancement." Harry's tone is challenging.

"Without. With the enhancement, about fifty-five times the speed of sound."

Cisco looks at him like he's crazy. "Holy crap – that's forty-two thousand miles an hour."

Eobard figures that must be extraordinary. "My Barry is even faster." Eobard doesn't bother to hide the pride in his voice. "His unenhanced baseline's twenty-one times the speed of sound. We both spill speed like water in a sieve."

"And you're thinking that we can capture your speed – the speed energy – and use it to replace Barry within the Speed Force?" Harry's question accurately sums up Eobard's plan.

"Yes. Barry and I – before everything went crazy – would routinely charge up the generators in Central City's power grid. But that's a different kind of storage. What you need is something almost ineffable – something that can straddle the physical world and the Speed Force. Any ideas?"

No one offers up any suggestion.

Eobard stifles a sigh. "Those specs on that weapon? Maybe they'll be a good starting point?"

Cisco heads over to a console and soon enough diagrams are displayed on all of the monitors. The weapon does make sense, in a very rudimentary way, but he's puzzled. "Why such a massive power requirement?"

Again, no one answers. 

"Harry – do you see the problem with this?" 

"Yeah – it's a bit over-engineered, sloppy quantum utilization." Harry grabs a marker and a board and starts sketching out some revisions. 

And he's way too slow. Eobard remembers his manners and doesn't snatch the marker or board away from Harry; there are several others he can use for does his own calculations. He doesn't care about the audience and gets to work; this is the first time he's used his speed since he'd arrived and it feels good.

Eobard references the original design several times, pushing Cisco away from the console. The first time he hears Cisco's outrage, he ignores it. The second time he goes to push Cisco out of the way, he looks up and to his utter shock, he sees Barry standing in front of him. It's not _his_ Barry. This is their Barry trapped in the Speed Force.

Eobard lets go of Cisco and Barry disappears.

"What the hell, Thawne? You have worse manners than Harry."

Eobard doesn't care about the insult, he wants the truth. "How come you didn't mention that you've been seeing Barry?"

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays! This is the last posting of the story until mid-January - just want to be able to relax and enjoy my time off. Will be back on Tuesday, January 15th. Enjoy yourselves and don't do anything that Eo wouldn't. Earth-52 Eo that is!


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Earth-52 Cisco arrives, bearing gifts and news. Cisco, Earth-1 version, finally gets hit with a clue-by-four about one of his ghosts. Harry and Earth-52 Thawne have a little physicist bonding time.
> 
> For the moment, everything is all right in The Cortex.
> 
> For the moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My deepest apologies. I hadn't ended to let this fall into the nearest black hole - I just completely and utterly forgot to restart the posting in January. But a lovely reader left feedback and I feel like such a terrible person to leave this story hanging.
> 
> Please enjoy this meaty chapter.

Cisco blinks. "Seeing Barry?" How the hell could Thawne know he's seeing ghosts? 

"Yes, seeing Barry from within the Speed Force. When I touched you at speed, I saw Barry. Don't tell me you haven't been seeing him." Thawne has dialed back the anger, but there's still an accusation there.

"I thought - " Cisco lets out a sigh. "I thought I was just seeing a ghost. I see HR sometimes, too. I thought I was haunted. Or maybe it was part of my powers, to see dead people."

Thawne reminds him, "But Barry's not dead."

"I know, I know. It's just - how can I say I'm haunted? How can I tell you that Barry follows me around like a puppy, just staring at me with eyes filled with lightning?" Cisco shudders. "The only time I don't see him is when Cynthia's around."

Thawne interrupts him. "Who's Cynthia?"

"My girlfriend-slash-mentor-slash-Earth-19 rival. She's a meta with powers like mine - she uses vibrational energy." Cisco feels like he's just gotten smacked by a clue-by-four. "And because she's from another Earth, her energy interrupts Barry's." He looks over to Harry for confirmation.

Harry nods, but then frowns at Thawne. "If that's correct, then how could you see Barry?"

"I was working at speed, pulling energy from the Speed Force - I was connecting with it in this dimension and when I brushed up against Cisco, I must have been able to tap into his own energy signature. Which might be what Barry is trying to do. He might be trying to communicate with you."

Cisco feels like a prize idiot and pulls at his hair. "You've got to be shitting me. Barry's been trying to contact me from the Speed Force and I've been ignoring him for six whole months?" He looks around the room. HR is in the corner, making faces. Barry's standing next to him, his expression as blank as always.

But for the first time, Cisco acknowledges his friend's "presence". 

"Hey, Bar? You there?" 

Barry-the-Speed Force Ghost doesn't react and when Cisco reaches out with his powers, Barry just disappears. HR, unfortunately, is still there, sticking his tongue out at Cisco. 

Cisco feels like an idiot. "So, if Barry's really trying to contact us, how does that help? Could it mean that Barry's not completely trapped? Maybe he's not caught in a nightmare like Wally had been?" Maybe he's not reliving the worst moment of his life. _Or maybe he is,_ Cisco can't help but think. Maybe every time that he'd shunned Barry, every cruelty he's flung at Barry, every time during those terrible weeks that he thought about just letting Barry die, maybe that's what Barry's reliving.

HR slaps at him. _"Don't be stupid, Francisco. Barry loves you; he understands why you were so angry at him. He's haunting you because he loves you. Because you can help him."_

Cisco tries to take heart from the ghostly advice and asks, "So, what now?"

Thawne scrubs at his face. "I don't know if this changes anything. We still need to engineer a speed energy container that can traverse realities." He gestures to the now-filled whiteboards. "I think the answer is here, I'm just not seeing it." 

Cisco can't quite believe what he's looking at - six boards are filled with Thawne's meticulous scrawl; equations that Cisco can barely comprehend. He looks over at Harry - theoretical physics is his realm, and is pleased to see that Harry's grabbed a marker and has started making annotations.

When Thawne grabs another marker and annotates the annotations, it gets funny. This time, Thawne isn't working at speed, but he's still faster than Harry and Harry's getting pissed. 

HR leans in and whispers, _"So, finally one of us can give Hard Hat Harry a run for his money."_

Cisco smiles and mutters - to HR and to himself - "I wonder who's going to throw down first." 

Neither man gets a chance. The alarm that announces the formation of a portal in the breach room sounds, interrupting the battle royale. "Looks like your Cisco is on his way."

Harry tosses down his marker and retrieves his pulse rifle. Thawne, in turn, gives Harry a dirty look and they head down to the breach room to greet the visitor, who has already arrived. 

Cisco, Earth-1 version, doesn't quite know how to react. Cisco, Earth-52 version, wears a shiny suit, and if that's not bad enough, his long hair is combed back into a ponytail so sleek it looks like glass. This Cisco also sports a tiny, perfectly trimmed soul patch and his ears are decorated with hoops and studs from lobe to crown. 

His doppelganger - at least this one - is a fucking hipster.

"Eo!" Cisco-52 drops the satchel he's carrying and holds out his arms.

The whole compare-and-contrast thing comes to a stuttering halt when Thawne and his doppelganger run to each other like long-separated lovers in a 1940s movie and hug. Thawne's face wears an expression of deep affection that Cisco's never seen on any Wells doppelganger - maybe the closest was HR when Jesse mistook him for Harry. 

And Harry, bless him straight to hell, leans over and whispers, "You've never greeted me like that. I'm hurt."

Cisco does his best not to listen in on the reunion between two people who clearly adore each other. It would be nauseating except he understands just how those two must feel after such a long and traumatic separation. He swallows his emotion when Thawne makes the introductions.

"Thanks for the invite." His doppelganger holds out a hand. Close up, Cisco can see that Thawne is right about the age difference. This version of him is a bit older; there are actually threads of silver in his temples and tiny crows' feet at the corner of his eyes.

"Thanks for dropping by and giving us a hand." 

"As if I would miss the chance to meet another me." Cisco, Earth-52 version, cocks his head and scans Cisco, head to toe. "Nice t-shirt."

Cisco looks down at what he's wearing - it has an Emo Hello Kitty on it, but he can barely remember putting it on this morning. "Um, thanks?"

The other him smirks - just a little - at least until Thawne says, "Be nice, Tremor. We're guests here." There's a sternness in his tone that reminds Cisco of the original not-Wells.

The smirk melts into a genuine smile. "Sorry, really." Tremor - because Cisco can't keep thinking of the doppelganger as "Cisco, Earth-52 Model" or something like that - may actually not be the asshole that Reverb had been.

Tremor's introduction to Harry is high comedy. "Well, well, well. Another Thawne. You a genius speedster, too?"

"Not a Thawne, not a speedster, but definitely a genius."

"Huh?" Tremor looks at Thawne, at Cisco and back at Harry.

"His name is Harrison Wells, he's from what our host calls 'Earth-2' and apparently the local version of Eobard Thawne was an evil genius speedster from the future who body-snatched this man's doppelganger and spent fifteen years pretending to be him. Have I got that right, Harry?"

"Close enough, Thawne. Except you've left out the interesting bits."

"Interesting bits?" Tremor reaches out to Harry, clearly attempting to vibe for the missing information.

Harry neatly dodges and Cisco _pushes_ his doppelganger back a few feet. "Remember, you're a guest."

Thawne steps between them. "I'll fill you in later, okay?"

Tremor makes a face, suddenly looking a lot younger. "It's bad?"

Thawne nods. "Yes, and there's no reason to make these nice people relive something they'd probably rather forget."

"Okay, okay." Tremor hands his satchel over to Thawne. "I've brought what you'd asked for, and then some."

"And then some?" Thawne lifts an eyebrow.

"You wanted the specs for the lining - I figured that given the amount of time you've been gone, you'd need more than just specs. Wove a whole new one for you. The new loom arrived a few weeks ago and I took it for a spin. The whole thing's in seven parts. One for the jacket, one for the pants, one for the cowl, and one for each boot and each glove; otherwise it's completely seamless. Shouldn't take much to get the old lining out and the new one in."

Cisco's itching to get a closer look at the contents of that bag, and not just a look - but a feel, too. And maybe a whole lot more, like getting a swatch under the new subatomic scanner Barry had ordered for him just before the Dominators had arrived. At the time, Cisco had snidely thanked Barry, blatantly suggesting that he shouldn't try to buy forgiveness. After the Dominators, after Barry had tried to surrender himself for the greater good of everyone he loved, including Cisco, Cisco could barely bring himself to use the equipment. 

"Why don't the two of you work on the suit? Harry and I have some calculations to argue over." Thawne pulls out a package and hands it to Cisco, then retrieves the jacket from Harry's lab and tosses it to Tremor.

"Where are the pants?"

"Cisco - " When both men turn to Harry, Harry corrects himself, "Vibe - take Tremor down to my quarters. You'll find them there."

Cisco claps his doppelganger on the shoulder, which probably isn't a great idea for a touch-telepath, but he gets nothing and Tremor doesn't even flinch. "Come on, we'll do better in my workshop and let these two geek out over the physics."

Tremor follows him through the building, his eyes widening at every sign of decay. Cisco waits for the inevitable "what happened here" and "what a dump" comments, but they don't come. Instead, Tremor says, "When all's right with the universe, want some help putting this place back together?"

Cisco's surprised at the offer, but won't turn it down. "Yeah, that'd be nice."

"We took some bad damage when the solar flares hit. And again when the Dominators came. I'm kind of an old hand at rebuilding S.T.A.R. Labs. This type of work runs in the family." Tremor smiles. "Is your dad in construction, too?"

"Nah - shipping. Has a few trucks that do long-haul cargo."

"Ah. Is your Dante alive?" There's almost too much hope in that question.

Cisco shakes his head. "No. Killed by a drunk driver about two years ago."

"I'm sorry. The Dominators got my Dante in the first wave. Nearly got Armando, too."

"Nothing can kill Armando." Cisco smiles. "He's indestructible in every universe, I bet."

"And an asshole, too." Tremor replies and both men laugh at the truth of that statement.

They arrive at Harry's quarters and find the pants to Thawne's suit draped over a chair, boots on the floor next to it. Cisco lets Tremor carry them; there's something about bottom half of the yellow suit that he finds more unnerving than the jacket or even the cowl.

Tremor isn't chatty, and Cisco's grateful. But he does have questions. "How many of us have you met?"

"You're the second. Our doppelganger from Earth-2 had been a certified psycho with delusions of godhood."

"Had been?"

"He's dead. And so is the Earth-2 version of Dante. Don't know anything about Earth-2 Armando, though."

Thankfully, Tremor doesn't ask for details and they are both quiet until they reach Cisco's workshop. Tremor doesn't hide his appreciation for Cisco's equipment, actually cooing over one of his CNC machines. 

"I thought you'd have more advanced tech than we do."

"Not really - Eo's good at projecting that, but we seem to be on a par. Maybe a little more advanced in some areas, not so advanced in others."

"You don't have to be such a diplomat."

Tremor grins at him. "I'm not. It's the truth." He leans against the main workbench and gives Cisco a considering look. "And speaking of truths, what's Eo not telling me? Why's he trying to protect your tender sensibilities?"

Cisco shakes his head. "Your Eobard Thawne is the essence of nobility. Mine wasn't." He makes short work of Doctor Evil's origin story.

"Ouch. The idea that Barry and Eo are enemies, that Eo tried to kill him, that he killed Nora. I can't even wrap my head around that. I'm surprised you didn't blast him to kingdom come when he arrived."

"I did. I knocked him out and shoved him in a cell."

"But you let him out. Why?"

"That was Harry's recommendation. He got all mushy when Thawne told him about Barry, about searching for him. Harry's daughter had been kidnapped by a monster, so there was a lot of sympathy going on there. They've bonded and it's a little disgusting and kind of amusing." 

Cisco turns on the monitor and dials in the cameras in the Cortex. "Let's see if they've killed each other yet. Harry's the definition of competitive and Thawne doesn't seem like a man who'll take losing, even to his own doppelganger, lying down."

Tremor actually chortles. "You've nailed it."

Cisco actually ignores the tempting package of material in favor of watching Harry and Thawne play dueling whiteboards. It's better than the Marx Brothers. Harry writes something, Thawne erases it and write something else and Harry throws the marker at Thawne. Who catches it, of course.

Tremor shakes his head. "They're having too much fun. It's good to see."

"Yeah."

"So - your Barry Allen? The note you sent said he's lost in the Speed Force, but you can't get him out without extraordinary measures."

Cisco nods at the antics still playing out on the monitor. "That's what they're doing - trying to formulate an energy vessel that can be filled with the Speed Force so we can safely extract Barry without the universe collapsing."

"Eo's always up for a challenge." Tremor takes the yellow jacket and turns it inside out, then makes a face. "God, this thing is rank. But what can you expect after six months."

"I'd give my left nut for a self-cleaning suit. No matter how much deodorant Barry and Wally wear, their suits reek in a day."

"Wally?"

Cisco sighs. "Another difference. We've got the full complement of Wests. Alive and well and all heroic. Wally's a speedster. Joe's a cop. Iris is part of Team Flash - and engaged to Barry."

Tremor stares at him. "You're shitting me."

"Nope." Cisco sighs and gives Tremor the Cliff Notes version of the sad and tragic life and times of Barry Allen. It's worth it just to see Tremor's jaw drop.

"Wow, the Dominatrix is engaged to the Flash. That's almost impossible to comprehend." Tremor shakes his head, clearly at a loss.

"For us, it's like the Flash being married to the Reverse-Flash."

"I would laugh at the idea of Eo being a villain, but when you say that he had murdered Nora, it's not even funny."

Cisco finds it interesting how Tremor, and yes – how Thawne – refers to Barry's mom by her first name. "You know Barry's mom well?"

"Yeah. She's something else."

Cisco doesn't know what Tremor means by that. "What do you mean?"

"She's – well – a terror. But in the best possible way. When Barry and Eo were in their comas after the lightning struck, she took up the reins at S.T.A.R. Labs. Kept everyone going, managed to pull us all together and make it work, make it better. She never let anyone doubt that those two wouldn't wake up and be back, better and stronger, but she had to be devastated. Eo's like her brother, and Barry – well, he's her son. And both of them just lying there – helpless – for so many months."

Cisco remembers those days, watching Barry, waiting for him, and in the background, Doctor Wells telling him to be patient, that Barry would wake up in his own good time.

"And when the Dominators came, when the Dominatrix tried to destroy everything, it was Nora who kept things going. She organized our world's metahumans to help in the fight, she stood strong with them even though she doesn't have any powers. She's the one who pulled the switch that sent the Dominators fleeing, that killed the Dominatrix. And created the Singularity that sent Barry and Eo out into the multiverse. She saved the planet, but did so knowing it could cost her her family. I don't think I could have done that."

Cisco tries to wrap his head around all of that. It's so strange to think of Nora Allen – the sweet woman from Barry's childhood stories – as a dynamic leader, someone like Felicity or Sara or Laurel, but with the age and experience of Tina McGee.

Tremor scrubs at his face. "When your message came, it was manna from heaven. We've all been holding it together and I've been able to make very brief contact when Eo's in transit between the universes, but we've heard nothing from Barry. It's so hard – with both of them gone. My boss, my best friend. And when I brought the message to Nora – well…" Tremor bites his lip. "With everything that's happened, Nora had never faltered, never let anything show, but that message – the one true bit of hope – she just started to shake. I thought she was going to cry, but she started to laugh – "

"Why?"

"The cookies – Eo asked for cookies. That's how we knew he was all right."

"He said that he added that so you'd know the message was really from him."

"Eo's love for Nora's cookies is legendary. At their wedding, she told everyone she'd had to bribe Eo with them to get him to ask Barry out on a date."

Cisco remembers that – it had been in the hologram that Thawne had shown them. Was that just a couple of hours ago - it feels like centuries. "Did you bring any?"

Tremor nods. "Yeah, of course. That's what took so long." He looks around. "You have a blue-light spectrum laser scalpel perchance?"

"Huh?" 

"To get the lining out of the suit – the fasteners will dissolve with that." 

"Ah." Cisco feels a little whipsawed by the change in subject. But he does have the requested instrument – two of them, actually, and once Tremor shows him what to do, they make quick work of removing the worn-out lining. Cisco graciously lets Tremor take care of the pants while he concentrates on the jacket. A slight change in the laser frequency and the new lining is sealed in. He's definitely going to need all of the specs for this. And a new loom.

Tremor stops fussing with the suit and gives him a hard look. "I know this is a quid pro quo situation – we get your Barry out of the Speed Force, you help us find our Barry. And by you – I mean _you_. You're going to help me scan the multiverse for as long as it takes to find him."

Cisco's not sure he likes Tremor's tone. "To succeed where you've failed?"

"Exactly, boyo. I don't know the breadth of your skills and you don't know mine, so I imagine we can teach each other a lot, but I'm not going to let you weasel out because you don't like the idea of our Barry and Eo together."

Cisco's jaw drops. "I never said I wouldn't."

"I don't have to vibe you to see how revolted you are by the idea."

"You're wrong – absolutely wrong. Yeah, the Thawne that built this place and killed Barry's mom might have been Doctor Evil, but he's not your Eobard Thawne, not in the least." Cisco looks up at the monitors. Harry and Thawne are still at work, whiteboards filling up and getting erased almost faster than the capture machines can operate. What is so startling is how both men are working in sync, smiling, and even though the sound isn't on, Cisco's almost positive they're bantering. "I didn't trust him at first, but I'll admit that he's changed my mind. He seems all right, and any man who asks his mother-in-law for cookies can't possibly be a total dick."

Tremor lets out a sharp bark of laughter. "Yeah, Eo's notorious about the cookies. And believe me, Nora's cookies are addictive."

The rough moment is smoothed over, at least until Tremor says, "Sorry for being such an ass, it's just knowing how different things are here that's putting me on edge. Hartley would kill me if he knew what I just said."

Cisco blinks. "Hartley? Hartley Rathaway?"

Tremor smiles, "Yeah - is your Hartley around, perchance?"

"My Hartley?" Cisco's getting a bad feeling about this.

Tremor loses his smile. "So I guess this is another difference. You're not married to Hartley, then."

"No." Cisco keeps it to a single word answer, and almost strangles himself on his tongue. If he said anything more, he'd likely find himself vibed to kingdom come.

"Ah. But at least tell me that Hart's not a villain here. I don't think his ego would tolerate that."

Cisco remembers a dream of an alternate timeline, one where Hartley had called himself the Pied Piper and tried to liquify Barry's internal organs. In this timeline, Hartley's still something of a stuck-up prick, but one who enjoys consulting with Team Flash from time to time, when he's not working on his third Ph.D. in sound-form physics. "Nah, Hartley's okay. He's got a gig at MIT this year, and has left us to our grimy work-a-day world."

Tremor chuckles. "That does sound like the Hartley that I know and love more than my own life." He fits the last piece of lining into one of the yellow and black boots and zaps the seams with the laser scalpel. "I think that's it."

"Do you happen to have the specs for the material?"

Tremor pulls a thumb drive out of his pocket and tosses it to Cisco. "This should work. Per Eo's command, full specs for the suit, the lining, the command and control systems with the emblem, and a few other goodies you might find useful in maintaining the health and well-being of your speedsters."

"Thanks." Cisco doesn't wait and plugs the drive into his computer, really not expecting it to work. But the screen quickly fills with a file system. "What do you know, you're from fifty-two universes away and you still use a LINUX based file system."

"I guess some things, how shall I say, _are_ universal?" Tremor comment, in a sly tone.

"Seems that way." Cisco glances through the specs; they appear well within his capabilities, although the sensor printing might need a consult at Harry's own S.T.A.R. Labs. But that's for the future. They've got a couple of speedsters to rescue.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Team Flash is one step closer to rescuing the Barrys - the one caught in the Speed Force, the other lost in the Multiverse.

Harry is exhilarated. He hasn’t worked with a mind this sharp, this creative, this _quick_ since Tessa died. To be able to throw out a word and have someone just _know_ what he’s talking about, where he’s going, is a heady feeling, one he’s missed for so long.

That he’s getting this from his speedster doppelganger is an irony that he half-loathes, half-relishes. Of course his trans-dimensional double would be his intellectual complement, but that the man is named Eobard Thawne is still a dissonance he has trouble reconciling.

Thawne, for this part, doesn’t seem to have the same problem. He’s grinning at Harry from the other side of the board, taking a brief pause before slipping back into speed mode to finish the equations. Of course, it would be just a little faster to let the computers do the work - but that’s splitting hairs. It’s clear that Thawne hadn’t exaggerated; he is as _fast_ as he’d claimed – faster than Barry, faster than Zoom, faster than Savitar. 

They work in perfect sync until Thawne comes to a full stop, right next to Harry. “I think we’ve got it.”

Harry steps back looks at the completed equations. The simplicity is stunning. “I think you’re right.” 

Thawne looks around the place, and sounding doubtful, asks, “Can we manufacture this here?” 

Harry nods. “Yeah. Cisco’s analogy was pretty spot on - this place looks like a dump but looks are deceiving. We’ve got the tools and materials to make this. It’s almost embarrassingly easy when you break it down."

"I always do prefer elegant simplicity, but I suspect that you might be someone who enjoys over-engineering."

"A bit." This isn't the first time Harry's been accused of that sin. He heads over to Cisco's console and calls down to the workshop. "Guys, we're ready for you."

There's no answer because the two Ciscos have just arrived, carrying various pieces of Thawne's suit. His Cisco drops the jacket and a boot onto a chair and comes over to stare at the equations. Tremor does the same.

"Looks good." 

"Cisco, you don't understand a single thing on this board, do you?"

"Nope." Cisco rocks back on his heels and grins at Harry. "But if you and Thawne say you've solved it, you've solved it. You might be a dick, but you're rarely wrong. At least about the physics."

Tremor chokes back a laugh and Thawne doesn't bother to restrain his own humor. 

Harry just grins and says, "Love you, too, you jack wagon." He's missed this. Since Barry's _departure_ , there's been a distinct scarcity of banter. Everyone's been existing in their own small version of hell. But no more. They can all move forward now.

"So, this is what do we need to do to make this work." Harry and Thawne trade off with the explanations and both Cisco and Tremor have questions, which leads to more explanations, some modifications, and another round of questions.

When everyone falls silent, Harry turns to Cisco and asks, "Do you have everything here to put this into fabrication?"

Cisco winces and Harry wonders if his migraine's coming back. He also wonders if Barry - a speed force ghost - is auditing all of this. 

Before Harry can ask if Cisco's okay, Cisco answers, "I think so. We have the isotopes, but I'm not so sure the synchrotron is going to take another firing. Between Evil Barry's tricks and the Speed Force raining holy hell down on us, the Particle Accelerator has taken a lot of damage. The tunnel structure is still sound, but …" Cisco trails off, shoving a fist in his mouth to stifle a yawn, "making sure the synchrotron is operational has been very low on the list of priorities."

Harry understands - there had been a point, shortly after Barry had walked into the Speed Force, when it looked like the FEMA warnings pinned to the S.T.A.R. Labs gates were going to be for more than show. "Shall I go home and get the parts we need?"

"Let's see what condition it's in." Cisco gestures towards the exit and Harry follows. He's not sure if Cisco wants some privacy to talk about their visitors or if he's giving his visitors privacy. Regardless, Harry's just a little surprised that Cisco's willing to leave Thawne and Tremor alone in the Cortex.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Eobard pretends to stare at the whiteboard, pretends to double-check the equations, but all the while keeping an eye on Tremor. Cisco.

Who is doing pretty much the same thing. Eobard doesn't say anything, hoping that Cisco breaks first. 

And he does. "You okay?"

Eobard sighs. "I've been better." That's the absolute truth.

"The hair… Man, when Barry sees you." Cisco chuckles. "He's going to freak _out_."

Warmed by Cisco's unwavering positivity, Eobard rubs his skull, the stubble still feels weird. "It'll grow."

"This is very strange, you know." Cisco laughs awkwardly. "It's like – "

"We don't know each other anymore."

"Yeah." Cisco rubs the back of his neck. 

"I always expected to come home, triumphant, with Barry at my side. It doesn't seem right that I need to be rescued." The admission is hard for Eobard. "I keep thinking, the next Earth - I'll find him there. But he's never there and then I just have to keep moving forward. Keep hoping"

"There was a time when we'd thought that you and Barry had been killed. For about a month. It was terrible." Cisco looks at him, his face drawn in lines of grief. "Nora stood fast, held everything and everyone together. And when no one was looking, she'd shut the door and scream until her throat was raw, until the walls were weeping. It took a while for Nora to believe me when I told her that you'd made contact when you'd been in transit. Then she accused me of wanting you gone; she didn't believe I couldn't rescue you."

"Why? That doesn't make sense. Nora knows better than that."

Cisco just shook his head. "When it came to you, Nora wasn't quite rational."

"Me? What about Barry?"

Cisco bit his lip and refused to meet Eobard's eyes. "She's never mentioned his name, not once. Not until we got your message. I think she's been too afraid. But now, I'm not sure." Cisco retrieve the satchel he'd carried across the multiverse and pulled out a red plastic container and a small book. "From Nora."

Eobard takes the proffered items and sets aside the container. The request for cookies had been a code, a joke, and he hadn't expected Nora to send any. But the book is something else entirely. It's a small thing, worn from age and hard use, with teething marks on one corner and a bit swollen from exposure to water. It's a child's book, a simple story that would have no meaning to anyone except a mother who'd kept this as a sentimental token. He'd never seen this before and wonders what it means.

Perhaps the title says everything, "The Lost Dinosaur."

And there's a note tucked between the cover and the first page. Eobard turns away from Cisco and heads into Harry's small lab, this feels too private to share.

_Eobard -_

_This was Barry's favorite book when he was little, and I can't help but take hope from it. That Barry is looking for you just as desperately as you are looking for him._

_Nora_

It hurts. Not like a fist to the stomach or a knee in his groin, but the ache of a knife scraping along bone. He'll never give up looking for Barry, he can't – but sometimes hope is almost out of reach.

_There once was a little dinosaur, a little Maiasaur who dreamed of adventure …_

The story is simple and devastating in its simplicity – a little dinosaur is separated from his family during a terrible rainstorm. He wanders through the forest, asking other creatures for help to find his family and his family is always just on the other side of the trees, trying to find him, always just missing each other until finally the little dinosaur turns around and walks right into his family's arms.

_The little Maiasaur would grow up and travel the world far and wide, but he always came home to his family._

Eobard let out a sob, tight and painful, and shoved his fist against his lips. He can't afford to break. Not here, not now.

"Boss?" Cisco's standing in the doorway.

"Give me a moment. I'll be … all right." 

Cisco doesn't believe him, but he does give Eobard the privacy he needs to pull himself together.

_You can do this, Eo. We will be together soon. I promise._

This isn't Barry, it's not the other half of his soul. It's simply wishful thinking given a familiar voice. But still, Eobard takes heart from it. Nora believes in him, Cisco believes in him. There are people here who trust him and are depending on his help.

From the corner of eye, Eobard sees some movement in the Cortex – followed by a loud crash. It's Cisco and he's scrambling back – hands extended as if to summon his powers.

Iris West and her brother look confused, but thankfully not frightened. "You're not our Cisco."

Eobard sighs and immediately places himself between Cisco and Iris and Wally West. "Stand down, Tremor – these are good people.

Cisco stares at him, a bit wild-eyed and speechless.

"Cisco – you know these are doppelgangers. Iris West isn't the Dominatrix here. You know that."

Eobard's words seem to penetrate and Cisco shakes himself out of his fear induced stupor. "I'm … sorry." The apology is half-hearted and he doesn't even try to meet Iris' eyes. "Perhaps it's better if I take myself off."

"No." Eobard isn't in the mood to coddle anyone. "You're too smart to behave like a child, Cisco. I won't let you close your eyes and hide from something you shouldn't be afraid of. I'm ashamed of you." 

Cisco goes pale at Eobard's words, but they do put some spine in him. His shoulders go back and now he does look Iris in the eye. "I am sorry and Eobard's right, I should know better."

Iris stares at Cisco for a moment and Eobard wonders if she's going to reject the apology. But no, she's as gracious as she'd been with him. "I understand. And I've been this, too." She flicks a glance over at Eobard. "His doppelganger wasn't exactly a saint."

"He killed your Barry's mom." Eobard is relieved that Cisco sounds close to normal.

Iris nods. "You've met Harry, right?"

"Yeah." 

"Let's just say his reception here wasn't without problems. My dad tried to shoot him on sight, but my Barry caught the bullets. So, your reaction isn't really all that out of the ordinary. I'd probably freak out, too."

Cisco looks at Eobard and smirks. Eobard decides that enough is enough. "Cisco, go find your counterpart and see what's needed."

Wallace acts as tour guide and takes Cisco to wherever Harry and Vibe are working, leaving Eobard alone with Iris.

She gives him a half smile. "Thanks for stepping in."

"I don't think Cisco would have actually hurt you."

Perhaps not, but thanks anyway." Iris sticks her hands in her pockets. "I don't know what's harder to accept, that my doppelganger had been an evil mass murderer, or that you're married to Barry Allen."

"That upsets you?" Eobard isn't surprised, but still undone by Nora's message, Iris' words cut like knives.

Iris nods and glances away. "Somehow, I thought Barry and I would be together in every universe."

Eobard doesn't placate. "That's a very self-centered and egotistical attitude. And far too much like your doppelganger, who engineered the deaths of millions because she was a spoiled child who couldn't get her way."

Iris turns ashen. "I would never – "

At the end of his rope, Eobard snaps, "Your attitude says otherwise. I've treated you with the utmost respect, Ms. West. I'm doing everything possible to get your fiancé back, and yet you whine at me because I'm married to a man you've never met, a man who happens to carry you fiancé's name and face, but is quite likely nothing like him."

"That's not fair."

Eobard walks away, waving a hand in dismissal. "Spare me, Ms. West." He encounters Harry, both Ciscos and Wallace as they head back to the Cortex. Harry and Vibe look smug.

"Good news. The synchrotron can handle another firing."

"Good – when can we get this done?" Eobard doesn't hide the impatience. He wants to get off this world. His Barry isn't here and he suddenly can't bear to see these hopeful faces anymore.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter I have written - I really do want to finish this story and I know how it ends. But it's going to be a while before I get to it, too many other commitments I need to finish. Thank you for following, and thank you in advance for your patience.


End file.
